The Pattern of Britain DVD, 1944-47

The films comprising The Pattern of the Britain were made at a unique moment in British history. Filmed between 1944-47, they serve the function of reclaiming the land and its regional differences for its inhabitants after years of seige during the Second World War. Any temptations to romanticise the land though is tempered by an emphasis on the amount of sheer hard work necessary to keep the countryside looking the way it does, and a realisation that the land was changing fast and old ways were dying.

The emphasis is on change and adaptability. Fenlands looks at the work needed to channel their yearly floods and retain the maximum acreage for crop growing, and also celebrates the laying of concrete roads throughout the area to counter the constant battle against mud. The Grassy Shires surveys the grasslands of Leicestershire and its surrounding counties and looks at how its famed pasture had to give way to arable production as part of the war effort and how this will now be integrated into an overall farming scheme. Cornish Valley looks at how the continuity of family traditions helps remote farms make the best of the often inhospitable terrain, while Downlands looks at farming life on the chalk downlands of southern England. In each of the films, past, present and future in the regions of Britain are linked in a way which it seems will never be quite as important again.

Mention must also be made of the excellent quality of these prints of rural life in the 1940s. Transferred from beautiful condition 35mm prints in the National Film Archive, they are clean and bright enough to show distinctly each ear of barley in a field before the combine harvester comes along.

Graeme Hobbs on 7th May 2005
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