Review of The First Born

The previous comment gives a full summary of the film, so except for one error- which is a massive spoiler, so I'll leave it to the end- I won't summarise the plot. Mander's astonishing film is almost a masterpiece, even in the truncated version that is left; if there is a problem, it is that he puts too much into it: infidelity, the 'double standard', illegitimacy, 'passing off', miscegenation, politics...all human life is there, and very well conveyed too. Well-photographed, with every scene relevant to the plot- for example, the way Nina's car disregardingly knocks over a bicycle as it leaves the kerb shows her personality perfectly, well-acted- one of the worst effects of sound on British cinema, I think, was the effect of accents; people were comic or grotesque or were required to use Received Pronunciation, no matter how inappropriate; with appropriate settings and scenes- a dinner party looks very much as though it is lit only by the four lamps on the table- an unrealistic scene, but astonishingly effective.

It isn't after a quarrel with his wife but with Nina, who has become his mistress, that Boycott dies- there's an effective scene, on the night of his unexpected return from Africa, showing their mutual seduction; the big flaw in the film, in fact, is that even in the 1920s, lifts can't possibly have been as hazardous as they are shown here and there's nothing in the film to make his death likely. There's no reason why Boycott shouldn't become an M.P. with many more mistresses and a miserable wife who pretends to be devoted to him. The only death I know that is more preposterous and arbitrary is that of Savaranola Brown.