Peter Watkins is one of the most radical and visionary film makers to have ever come out of Britain . He was the pioneer of the " docu-drama " before the term came in to popular usage . After seeing his famous BBC docu-drama CULLODEN I decided to revisit his Oscar winning documentary THE WAR GAME and his only attempt at a mainstream hit feature film PRIVILEGE from 1967 . Make no mistake Watkins is a great visionary and a very interesting director . The downside is that his work is often spoiled by massive overstatement which is like being locked in a room with someone who has over dosed on polemical political Prozac . He's anti-war , anti-military , and anti-establishment . If you're watching a film called THE DIARY OF AN UNKNOWN SOLDIER written and directed by one Peter Watkins you might just be able to second guess the style and content of it
It's set during the First World War and revolves around a new recruit in the British Army about to fight his first battle . There's no dialogue from the characters and the story is told via the spoken thoughts of the unnamed lead . Watkins provides the voice of this character and that's a major failing right there . Whatever the talents of Watkins as a director he's not an actor . In fact I've got to be brutally honest and say the posh BBC newsreader type tone of Watkin's voice ends up dragging the whole production in to something unintentionally funny . I did state that the overdone solemn tone of CULLODEN ended up resembling BLACKADDER and here I was reminded of something that resembles a Great War version of a Monty Python sketch
One other thing this earlier work shares with CULLODEN is an over reliance on close up . Okay I understand that budget is always a problem with a production like this hence we don't get a battle scene on a par with Lewis Milestones ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT but the use of close up goes way beyond necessity . It was a running joke in classic DOCTOR WHO that no matter what planet the Tardis landed on it always resembled a quarry in Surrey and here the location might very possibly that very same quarry but we don't get to see it in any detail . Instead the screen is constantly filled with a close up of the protagonists frightened face . There is a segment where branches of trees are intercut with the fixed bayonets of the soldiers so it does indicate a creative imagination on the part of the director but as directorial technique goes this film is schizophrenic to say the least
All this is a shame because no matter what you can't help coming away from a Watkins film with very strange mixed feelings and none of these feelings are indifference . Even if you didn't like the film you've just seen you get a compulsion to seek out Watkin's other works which are often obscure and very difficult to find and the reasons his work is obscure and difficult to find is probably the same reason why you want to seek it out
