Film:
Fires Were Started (
I Was a Fireman)
Format: DVD from NetFlix on kick-ass portable DVD player.
There’s always something fascinating to me about propaganda films, especially those that try to proclaim themselves something other than propaganda films. A case in point is director Humphrey Jennings’s
Fires Were Started (also called
I Was a Fireman). This is a wartime film, released during World War II about the Blitz of London and the men who risked their lives as firefighters every night in the aftermath of the latest raid. It’s not really a documentary, but rather a re-creation using actual fires lighted on bombed-out buildings. It’s more or less based on the specific hell these men and women when through on a nightly basis.
Really, what I’ve said above is pretty much the bulk of the film. The first half consists of a group of firemen relaxing and jawing with each other. They play pool and gather around the piano singing songs. This is particularly important since one of them, a man named Barrett, is new on the squad. The second half of the film is little more than the various firefighting teams heading out to battle the blazes caused by yet another bombing run. In particular, one fire threatens to be significant thanks to the location of live munitions near the blaze.
