There are those American film writer types that deconstruct Casablanca as the perfect screenplay. You know look at Bogart and Bergman's clothes in that market scene. They have stripes which means they are imprisoned.
A British writer held out Jack Rosenthal's The Evacuees as an example of good writing. Show not tell.
This BBC television movie is Alan Parker's first full length feature. Until then he had made his name in the advertising world. He would go on to become an acclaimed movie director.
The Evacuees is a simple story. As war against Germany nears, young Jewish boys from Manchester are sent to the seaside either to Blackpool or Lytham St Annes.
I am not sure how it worked in reality but in this drama. The teacher takes the kids around knocking on doors and dropping the kids off to anyone willing to take them.
The Miller brothers are evacuated to an elderly couple, the Graham's. Against their Jewish religion they have to eat pork sausages. They also have to do housework and they suspect Mrs Graham's is destroying the letters that their mum sent them. They are miserable along with the other lads.
Back in Manchester, Rosenthal does not write a scene where the Miller's describe how miserable they are. You see them quietly eating dinner as there are two empty chairs in the room.
The strange thing is despite showing no outward signs of caring for the kids, Mrs Graham really wanted the children to stay with her and was pleased to have them. Again there is a scene where she smells the children's clothes after she cleaned them.
It is these little things that make the drama stand out.
