Tom Brown's School Days

Whilst I thought that Cedric Hardwick gave an excellent performance as the headmaster, I thought that the performance of Robert Newton was better

This work is primarily occupied with the major incidents in the life of Thomas Arnold, headmaster of Rugby, and his overcoming of a good deal of resistance in lifting that institution from a tepid state to a position of England's finest public school. The strong direction is by Robert Stevenson, who also contributed mightily to the script, which is rather faithfully based upon the novel of the same name by Thomas Hughes, and which employs the student Tom Brown as Arnold's tactical and ethical surrogate within the scholastic body. Arnold, who must find an answer to the prevalent bullying of the day, is portrayed by Sir Cedric Hardwicke with a stunning performance, ably supported by Josephine Hutchinson as Mrs. Arnold. The film proceeds at a very crisp pace, with the scenario building well as Brown, played with feeling by Jimmy Lydon, prepares to make a stand against older and tyrannical students led by Billy Halop as Flashman. The arteries of the novel are presented with some depth, demonstrating the inculcation into the students of the importance of physical and mental courage, loyalty, and self-reliance, albeit apparently at the cost of some amount of intellectual achievement. The love of the students for Rugby and for their headmaster is presented throughout, the production design, costumes, and editing are all first-rate, and a superb musical score is contributed by Anthony Collins.

one of the best old movies I have ever seen and would like to own it either on DVD or video, its exciting from start to finish, with a great story line even I could understand even at the early age of 14yrs, it has few good actors who in my mind will never be replaced even now. A clean film for all the family, something to get your teeth into with a story line that needs to be watched and listened too. even though black and white the film was well produced for its time and I would love to see it again over and over again. considering the age and the location the film contained beautiful places of interest and lots of great actors, these people will never be seen again which is why we should keep this film ongoing and to the fore front of all films.

Plush Hollywood production values (including atmospheric photography by cameraman Nicholas Musuraca, soon to be become legendary for his work on film noirs) combine with offbeat casting (such as Dead End Kid Billy Halop as Flashman) and the bold decision to cast an actor rather than a star as the inspiring Dr.Arnold.

The film begins and ends with a reminder that Arnold himself died in only his 47th year, and nearly two centuries later bullying remains (as he himself says) "a tradition in our schools". Still going strong, alas.

Jimmy Lydon plays the title character, but the point of view occasionally cuts away to Cedric Hardwicke as the radical and revered Thomas Arnold. Judging by this movie, his great innovation was to cast out liars and talk the Sixth Form into badmouthing bullying.

Even so, the performances are fine in a Code-compliant manner, with a solid juvenile cast including Freddy Bartholomew and Gale Storm in her feature debut. It's also director Robert Stevenson's first American movie. He would stay for the rest of his career and by the early 1970s would become the most successful movie director ever, if you went by unadjusted-for-inflation grosses of all his movies. He was not an auteur. He gave the producer and, it turned out, the audience what it wanted. At this point, he was becoming the go-to director for Ye Olde England movies. Like many a director, he retreated to TV in the early 1950s, but hooked up with Walt Disney in the latter half of the decade, and directed many of his gimmick live-action comedies.