by Miguel E. Rodriguez
DIRECTOR: Alexander Mackendrick
CAST: Alec Guinness, Joan Greenwood, Cecil Parker, Michael Gough
MY RATING: 8/10
ROTTEN TOMATOMETER: 100%
PLOT: An altruistic chemist invents a fabric which resists wear and dirt as a boon to humanity, but both big business and labor realize it must be suppressed for economic reasons.
First, a brief history lesson:
“The Ealing comedies is an informal name for a series of comedy films produced by the London-based Ealing Studios during a ten-year period from 1947 to 1957. Often considered to reflect Britain’s post-war spirit, the most celebrated films in the sequence include Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949), Whisky Galore! (1949), The Lavender Hill Mob (1951), The Man in the White Suit (1951) and The Ladykillers (1955)… Many of the Ealing comedies are ranked among the greatest British films, and they also received international acclaim.” – from Wikipedia
There. That summarizes it way better than I could. Watch enough British films and the term “Ealing Studios” will invariably come up. Their comedy films have a breezy, economical quality, sometimes combined with dark humor and almost always with something to say about the conditions in Britain at the time.
The Man in the White Suit is a prime example of the Ealing comedies (although Kind Hearts and Coronets is my personal favorite). In this film, the versatile Alec Guinness portrays Sidney Stratton, an unemployed inventor with a head for chemistry and textiles. He stumbles upon a formula that he believes will create the ultimate cloth: impervious to stains and virtually unbreakable. After a series of pyrotechnic failures, he cracks the code and makes a white suit out of his miracle material.
The storytelling for this whole first half of the film is quick as lightning. Director Mackendrick wisely realizes that lengthy exposition is the enemy of good pacing, so we get a lot of quick scenes that linger only long enough to make their point before we fade into the next one. While watching it, I began to worry that this rapid rhythm would hinder my investment in the story, but in retrospect, it almost feels like we’re inside Sidney’s head. On film, he’s almost always running, rarely strolling except when he’s trying to fool any casual observers. When he makes his breakthrough, his speech becomes a rattling string of syllables that might require subtitles to decipher, his excitement nearly derailing his ability to talk.
Once he creates this magical cloth and fashions a suit out of it (resorting to blowtorches to cut the suit patterns), he beams. What a boon to mankind! You can’t damage it, you can’t get it dirty…it’s the only suit you’ll ever have to buy! What a windfall! Well, not so fast. He immediately encounters resistance from both sides of the textile supply chain. The laborers who work in the textile mills don’t like it because they envision making only one set of clothes per person and that’s it; it never needs replacing. Competing companies (management) don’t like it because no one will buy anything else, and it will put them out of business. Sidney becomes caught in this tug of war, and the whole second half of the film becomes a variation of chase scenes as Sidney struggles to publicize his invention while labor and management fight to suppress it.
There’s an interesting subplot when management tries to persuade Daphne, the daughter of the company’s owner, to seduce Sidney into signing away his rights to his invention. In an era when most women’s roles were relegated to love interests, her reaction to this offer is unique: she calmly asks, in so many words, “How much is this worth to you?” She negotiates her fee much the same way as a high-priced escort might. The board members are scandalized when they realize exactly what they’re asking her to do, and what is being negotiated. But instead of shying away from it, Daphne embraces it. Neat. (Her “seduction” of Sidney has a clever resolution that I did not see coming.)
Like other great films, The Man in the White Suit offers a lot to chew over after the credits roll. Sure, the last half of the film offers lots of comedy and chase scenes and farcical situations to satisfy any film lover. But the underlying concept is more interesting the more I think about it. It’s not exactly a NEW idea, but interesting, nevertheless. One of the workers at the textile mill tells Sidney: “The razor blade that never gets blunt. And the car that runs on water with a pinch of something in it. No. They’ll never let your stuff on the market in a million years.” We’ve all heard the urban myths of rubber tires that never wear out, or even the cars that run on water (just saw that one on the internet the other day). Are they real? Probably not. But it’s fun to think so, to imagine the shadowy forces suppressing brilliant inventions for the purpose of commerce.
But there’s a flip side to the story. During Sidney’s pursuit, he runs into an old washer woman and asks for a coat to cover his suit (the material’s properties make it practically luminous at night). She happens to know about Sidney and his invention, and she tells him, “Why can’t you scientists leave things alone? What about my bit of washing when there’s no washing to do?” More than anything else, this gives Sidney pause, and I can almost hear him thinking, in the back of his head, the immortal words of Ian Malcolm: “Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn’t stop to think if they should.”
In this way, The Man in the White Suit offers more food for thought than I would have expected. It’s making a statement about the inevitability of scientific progress, pleading with the responsible parties to be more, well, responsible with their actions. This film was released only six short years after America ended World War II by dropping atomic bombs on Japan, so the question resonates more dramatically than you might expect from such a breezy comedy.
I can almost hear you asking, “Yeah, but is it funny?” Yes, this delightful Ealing comedy is in the best traditions of the form. It’s not too heavy, asking the big questions but wisely not answering them. It has plenty of smiles and laughs. And for those who have never seen Alec Guinness as a young man in the movies, it’s a treat to watch a very young Ben Kenobi cavorting on the screen with his eyes bugged out and a silly grin on his face. And if it offers food for discussion afterwards, all the better.
P.S. Look for a very young Michael Gough in the cast, aka “Alfred” in Tim Burton’s Batman.
2 UNPAID MOVIE CRITICS!!!! 