Scott of the Antarctic (1948)

Scott of the Antarctic is a British adventure film first released in 1948, directed by Charles Frend.  The film stars John Mills, Diana Churchill, Harold Warrender, Anne Firth and Derek Bond.  Our overall rating for this film is: very good.


In 1904, Captain Robert Falcon Scott returns to England after a survey expedition of Antarctica, frustrated that so much has yet to be discovered about the unknown continent.  Determined to make a return visit, the explorer immediately begins to raise funds for another expedition, whose main objective will be to reach the South Pole, a feat that no man has yet achieved.  By 1910, Scott has assembled a crew and has raised just enough money to make his dream a reality, or so he thinks.   His ship, the Terra Nova, takes him and his team as far as the Great Ice Barrier, an arduous 900 miles from the South Pole.   Here, Scott and his men set up a base camp where they will sit out the six-month long sunless winter, ready to resume their journey to the pole in the spring.  News is received that the Norwegian Roald Amundsen has mounted a rival, better equipped expedition and has set up camp a mere few hundred miles away.   With the return of the sun, Scott’s expedition begins in earnest, but it soon becomes apparent that the explorer has seriously underestimated the difficulties that lie ahead.  The motorised sledges which Scott had believed superior to dog sledges soon break down in the extreme conditions of the Antarctic.  Likewise, Scott’s decision to use  ponies in place of dogs proves to be a terrible mistake.  After numerous setbacks, Scott and four of his team finally reach their objective, only to find that Amundsen has beaten them to it.  His dreams shattered. Scott leads the return back his base, but the weather conditions take a sudden turn for the worse.  Scott’s failure will be crowned by the death of himself and his four companions, just eleven miles from a camp stocked with a plentiful supply of food and fuel.  But his story is not forgotten, for the diary he leaves behind provides a detailed and lasting record of his final expedition.

Scott of the Antarctic was one of Ealing Studios’ most ambitious productions, one of the first films made by the company to be shot in colour and one that provides an authentic account of Captain Scott’s ill-fated polar expedition of 1910-12.  The film was perfectly judged to fit the mood of post-war Britain with its portrayal of stiff-upper-lipped pluck in the face of adversity and succeeded in vividly bringing to life a story known to every schoolboy in the country.

The film was directed by Charles Frend, one of Ealing’s finest directors, best known for his realist wartime dramas San Demetrio London (1943) and The Cruel Sea (1953).  The distinguished cast is headed by John Mills, always the obvious choice for the role of the archetypal English hero, with sterling support from the likes of Derek Bond, Harold Warrender, Kenneth More and James Robertson Justice.  More than anything, it is the realism that these peerless actors bring to their portrayals which makes the film so poignant and compelling, particularly in the later scenes when their characters’ fate becomes all too apparent.

Whilst the budgetary limitations are a little too evident in a few places, Scott of the Antarctic still stands as one of Ealing’s most visually impressive films.  The stunning location photography (shot in Norway and Switzerland), inter-cut with some truly breathtaking colour footage of the Antarctic Peninsula, achieves a near-documentary realism whilst conveying the awesome splendour of the cruel continent that Scott and his men sought to tame.  Vaughan Williams’ evocative score (which the composer later reworked as his Sinfonia Antartica) brings a lyrical quality that greatly heightens the intensity of the viewing experience.  With Scott’s own diary providing the basis for much of the narrative, the film’s depiction of events could hardly be more authoritative.

Scott of the Antarctic is an unusual film for the period in which it was made because it portrays the virtues of courage and resolve in a deeply ironic light and is almost a celebration of failure -  a stark contrast to what we find in the propaganda films that were made just a few years earlier.  Scott’s errors of judgement are clearly signposted so that the viewer is left in no doubt that ill-preparation and over-confidence played as much a part in the failure of the expedition as bad luck.

By 1948, the British Empire was rapidly becoming a thing of the past and it was no longer appropriate or credible to portray Britain as an invincible nation of flawless superheroes.  Films such as this began to show the British in a more honest, and arguably better light - as a plucky little country determined to punch above its weight, whilst abiding by the time-honoured traditions of decency and fair play.  Captain Scott is the quintessence of Britishness, a man who reached for the sky only to fall headfirst into the metaphorical gunge tank of history.  This explains both why he is still feted as a national hero and why this film about his one great failure is so fondly remembered.  Success isn’t everything.

© filmsdefrance.com 2009

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