In a recent review in the Times Literary Supplement, American sociologist and historian Richard Sennett examined the failure of socialism in the United States and argued that Americans seem to have a different take than people in England and continental Europe on collectivity itself. One reason he suggests for this difference—that slavery confused and perhaps even undermined our overall sense of the dignity of labor, ultimately altering our sense of collective labor—is both provocative and debatable. But whether or not one buys into his theory, it’s hard to deny that Americans practice and relate to groupthink somewhat differently than Europeans. “The herd of independent minds” was the late Harold Rosenberg’s memorable phrase describing us in all our paradoxical singularity.
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I happened to read Sennett’s words a few hours after seeing the restoration of Michael Powell’s beautifully archaic and mystical 1937 epic about communal life on Foula—the Shetland island farthest from the coast of Scotland—which is playing this week at the Music Box. They help pinpoint why, in spite of his passionate romantic individualism, Powell had a relationship to collective consciousness that has few if any counterparts in American movies. Probably the greatest English filmmaker after Hitchcock, Powell (1905-1990) was an unapologetic Tory throughout his career, so I’m not trying to argue that his feeling for groups had any traces of leftism. For that matter, even though this is a 30s movie, socialism is barely an issue; apart from some government assistance when the islanders have to evacuate because of harsh living conditions, it barely comes up. Yet the communal feel of the picture is unmistakable, and unmistakably British to boot—providing a sensibility that in some ways is as exotic as the towering sea cliffs of Foula, the most spectacular I can recall seeing anywhere.
I’m grateful that this short is included with the feature rather than Return to The Edge of the World, the documentary Powell made in 1978 as a wraparound for a shorter version of the feature, chronicling his reunion with surviving actors and crew on Foula more than 40 years later. Though this half-hour color film has its charms, it takes the cozy tone even further, sometimes coming across like a home movie that makes outsiders feel excluded. Its most entertaining patch is perhaps a monologue delivered by Powell to the camera while taking off a sweater: “Don’t tell anyone—I’m a poet. A poet is not without honor save in his own country, and I suppose that’s why most of my big chances were given to me by Hungarians or Americans.” (He goes on to credit Joe Rock, the American ex-vaudevillian who produced The Edge of the World, and the New York film critics who named it the best foreign movie of 1937, which led to him getting hired by Alexander Korda.)
My point is that Powell’s dreams of collectivity and individuality are all that really count. Realized with professional and nonprofessional actors alike, in real locations effectively turned into fantasy landscapes through the force of Powell’s vision, The Edge of the World is ultimately a more satisfying and less pernicious version of epic documentary as mythology than the kind offered by Leni Riefenstahl’s Olympia, shot the same year and coincidentally playing at the Film Center this weekend.
Directed and written by Michael Powell
With John Laurie, Belle Chrystall, Eric Berry, Finlay Currie, Niall MacGinnis, Grant Sutherland, Campbell Robson, and Powell.
