IN WHICH WE SERVE 171
at the 8th Annual Berlin Film Festival shortly thereafter, the movie won the
FIPRESCI Award, sharing it with Ingmar Bergman’s Smultronstället (Wild Strawber-
ries). It also received a Golden Bear nomination at the 1958 Berlin Film Festival
and three BAFTA nominations in 1959. Ice Cold in Alex was not released in the
United States until 22 March 1961— unfortunately, under the misleading title,
Desert Attack, and in a radically truncated version (54 minutes shorter) that made
it an unwatchable travesty of the original movie.
Reel History Versus Real History
Like his fictional counter parts, Anson and Pugh, author Christopher Landon was a
British ambulance officer in North Africa, well familiar with Austin K2/Ys and the
rigors of life in the North African desert, fighting Rommel’s Afrika Korps: intimate
knowledge that lent the novel and film authenticity. Nolan’s original story and novel
are pure fiction, but, according to Sue Harper and Vincent Porter, Nolan based
Sgt. Major Pugh on a longtime friend and made him the novel’s central protagonist
father figure to Anson and the love interest of Sister Murdoch (Harper and Porter,
2007, p. 88). The movie makes Anson its protagonist and Diana Murdoch his love
interest. The film also elides most of the backstories of the four principal characters
that are provided in the novel, and both book and film contain some far- fetched
thriller ele ments. One feature hard to credit is the notion that a German spy would
attach himself to a solitary ambulance in retreat and radio back constant reports to
headquarters. Highly implausible from a physics standpoint is the scene showing
Katy being inched up a steep sand hill by hand cranking its starter gear in reverse
after disconnecting the spark plugs. The technique could actually work on hard,
level ground but the steep gradient (perhaps 20 to 25 degrees), deep sand, and the
sheer weight of the ambulance (actually three tons, not two, as mentioned in the
film) would abet gravity in rendering the task physically impossible.
In Which We Serve (1942)
Synopsis
In Which We Serve is a British war film written by Noël Coward and directed by
Coward and David Lean. A patriotic propaganda film made during the Second
World War with the full backing of the Ministry of Information, In Which We Serve
is a fictionalized recounting of the exploits of Lord Louis Mountbatten, commander
of the destroyer HMS Kelly, which was sunk during the Battle of Crete (May 1941).
Coward composed the film’s musical score and also starred as the ship’s captain.
Background
During World War II Lord Louis “Dickie” Mountbatten (1900–1979), the second
cousin, once removed, of Queen Elizabeth II, commanded the British Royal Navy’s
5th Destroyer Flotilla aboard his flagship, HMS Kelly. A K- class destroyer (1,695
tons) commissioned on 23 August 1939, Kelly’s ill- fated time in ser vice lasted only
one year and nine months. On 23 May 1941, during the Battle of Crete, the ship