Fires Were Started

The build-up is dreadfully dull, but things get cooking (*snicker*) once the actual firefighting starts. Then there's some excitement and a few really great shots, especially of the aftermath. Pretty good editing, too. But most of the dialogue is muffled, competing with the background noise/music, or obscured by heavy accents. The boring first act really drags my score down, and the rest of it wasn't impressive enough to make up for that, but in general the film was okay.

# 555

I don't want to say this is a bad film, because it's well shot and historically interesting, but most of it is really really dull. It also relies too heavily on the 'stiff upper lip, doing it for the war effort" theme. Some good shots in the second half show Jennings' talent though, and the piano scene is nice. Watch A Diary for Timothy or Listen to Britain instead.

590

638

#680

Quite boring, but not terrible. The only real notable aspect is that the camerawork is good.

Some nice shots and a couple of nice scenes with the firefighting and the fighters gathered around the piano but also a lot of non-gripping and boring scenes.

Humphrey Jennings' extended drama documentary about the fire brigade during World War II. You can see the beauty of his atmospheric down to earth style of imagery. Not to mention of the realness of ordinary people in it. Perhaps not the most thrilling film one will come across, but a creation one will respect for it's craftmanship.

Overall its nothing exceptional. The first third is a lot of day-to-day activities, stations calling in to report readiness, fire fighters relaxing and having a sing-along before the night's action begins. Its interesting for the historical view of the city, the genuine faces of the people and the actions of fighting the fires.

As a wartime propaganda film its creatively shot - it may seem dull watching today but is a good evocation of time and place.

This is an interesting historical document about the work of firefighters during the Blitz. It's dramatized (though using actual firefighters as the actors), not a full documentary, but seeing some of the processes about things worked at the time are interesting. The actual firefighting is much better than the first half or so. Boring to non-boring ratio is way too high, though. Not terrible.

Fires Were Started estreava há 80 anos no Reino Unido. Jurava que já tinha assistido esse na minha binge obsessiva de cinema britânico, mas aparentemente não. Por ser do Jennings é uma propaganda de guerra melhor do usualmente víamos vindo da Inglaterra. BlurayRip RARBG.