School for Secrets (also known as The Secret Flight [1]) is a 1946 British black-and-white drama film written and directed by Peter Ustinov and starring Ralph Richardson. In leading supporting roles are David Tomlinson, Raymond Huntley, Finlay Currie, Richard Attenborough, John Laurie and Michael Hordern.[1][2] Based on a 1942 RAF training film for would-be 'boffins' and developed with the full cooperation of the Air Ministry, the film celebrates the discovery of radar, its discoverers and the enabling culture.[3][4] Produced by Two Cities Films, it was shot at Denham Studios with sets designed by the art director Carmen Dillon.

Plot

School for Secrets tells the story of the "boffins" – research scientists – who discovered and developed radar and helped prevent the German invasion of Britain in 1940. Five scientists, led by Professor Heatherville, are brought together to work in secrecy and under pressure to develop the device. Their dedication disrupts their family lives as they are forced to sacrifice everything to make a breakthrough. Their success is illustrated by the effect radar has on the fighting abilities of the RAF over the skies of Britain in the summer and autumn months of 1940. However, Germany is also planning its own radar capability and British commandos are dispatched to strike a German installation. The raid re-enacted the actual Bruneval Raid on the German Freya radar station on the French coast, where Fl Sgt Cox won the MM, as the radar technician pinching the German equipment, and Pte Peter Newman aka Nagle, the German Jewish volunteer helped kidnap the correct German technicians who were brought back for the crucial questioning on how the parts worked. Thus the scientists complete their work just in time for D-Day.

Messages

The film only represents events and characters in the most general way. It ostensibly celebrates the boffins, but C. P. Snow and the RAF come out of it well, particularly in the terms of recruitment, leadership, the 'Sunday Soviets' and more generally collaboration between scientists of different backgrounds, between boffins and the services, and between the more technical officers and the more familiar 'officer and gentleman' types. The boffins with technically relevant specialities are represented as having technocratic tendencies, requiring careful handling. Solly Zuckermann is represented as a key character. As a zoologist he is a respected scientist who shares the initial ignorance of the RAF on electronics, and thus provides a vital bridge between cultures. Reference is made to his previous work on 'the social life of monkeys and apes'.[5] The difference between German and British practice is well illustrated, where open bickering is more productive than sullen compliance.[3] It is such aspects, rather than historical or technical details, that the film strives to put across.

Cast

Critical reception

The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote: "The film is well constructed, the story is exciting, full of poignancy and humour. Each part – there are no minor parts among the men – is played with directness and restraint."[6]

Kine Weekly wrote: "Laboured and untidy wartime comedy drama, loosely woven from the private lives and professional activities of the Rradar backroom boys ... The film is neither instructive, particularly amusing nor flattering to England's incomparable man of science. ... The story of Radar is definitely one that should be told, but not as it is here in a Blimpish comedy vein."[7]

The Radio Times Guide to Films gave the film 3/5 stars, writing: "After the war the RAF and the Ministry of Defence wanted to boast about their invention of radar and the job of producing, directing and writing the account went to the 25-year-old Peter Ustinov. Ralph Richardson plays the boffin and there are some halfhearted action scenes and mini-melodramas to flesh out the reams of technospeak. Ustinov's refusal to make a blatant back-slapper suffuses the film with both a distorted attitude to heroism and a cartoonish wit."[8]

Leslie Halliwell wrote "An unsatisfactory entertainment which, with the best intentions, shuffles between arch comedy, character drama, war action and documentary, doing less than justice to any of these aspects."[9]

TV Guide wrote, "as would be expected from young writer-director Ustinov (he was 25 years old at the time), a nice sense of humour is integrated into the proceedings, a refreshing change from the deadly serious propaganda films that dominated the screen at the time. Unfortunately, portions of School for Secrets are too talky and tend to drag on past the point of interest, but the action scenes are excitingly handled and manage to keep the narrative aloft."[10]

Britmovie called the film a "sprightly melodrama. With its starry cast of character actor and witty dialogue, Ustinov focuses more on the diverse characters than scientific advances."[11]

References

  1. ^ a b "School for Secrets". British Film Institute Collections Search. Retrieved 13 March 2025.
  2. ^ "School for Secrets". BFI. Archived from the original on 12 July 2012.
  3. ^ a b O'Neill, Esther (October 2006). "BRITISH WORLD WAR TWO FILMS 1945-65: CATHARSIS OR NATIONAL REGENERATION?". Thesis. University of Central Lancashire: 77, 78. S2CID 140789641. The RAF has gained a reputation during the last few years, not only of being a brilliant warlike organisation, but also of inventing a new language. Among the lesser known words which appeared in the welter of "prangs", "scrambles" and "wizards", was the world "boffin", meaning scientist. Once upon a time a Puffin, a bird with a mournful cry, got crossed with a Baffin, an obsolete service aircraft. Their offspring was a Boffin. This bird bursts with weird and sometimes inopportune ideas, but possesses staggering inventiveness. Its ideas, like its eggs, are conical and unbreakable. You push the unwanted ones away and they just roll back. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  4. ^ Spicer, Andrew (25 July 2003). Typical Men. Bloomsbury Academic. ISBN 9781860649318.
  5. ^ Zuckerman, S. (27 December 1933). "The Social Life of Monkeys and Apes". Philosophy. 8 (30): 245–246. doi:10.1017/S003181910006277X – via PhilPapers.
  6. ^ "School for Secrets". The Monthly Film Bulletin. 13 (145): 148. 1 January 1946. ProQuest 1305811946.
  7. ^ "School for Secrets". Kine Weekly. 357 (2065): 35. 14 November 1946. ProQuest 2676978475.
  8. ^ Radio Times Guide to Films (18th ed.). London: Immediate Media Company. 2017. p. 809. ISBN 9780992936440.
  9. ^ Halliwell, Leslie (1989). Halliwell's Film Guide (7th ed.). London: Paladin. p. 889. ISBN 0586088946.
  10. ^ "School For Secrets". TV Guide. Archived from the original on 8 December 2014.
  11. ^ "School for Secrets". britmovie.co.uk.
Allikas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_for_Secrets
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