Richard Todd OBE 1919 - 2009
Richard Todd, the actor, who died on December 3 aged 90, was one of the first British officers to land in Normandy in advance of the main D-Day landings and went on to become Britain's highest-earning matinee idol of the post-war years; his most memorable role was that of Wing Commander Guy Gibson, VC, in The Dam Busters (1955), a film he carried with the help of Michael Redgrave as Barnes Wallis.
You can find an account of his wartime & D-Day expirences here & let’s just say that when you see the ponces that are laughably referred to these days as film stars, Todd was a real man. This weekend, I shall be watching both The Dam Busters & The Longest Day (yet again)
Comments
Yeah, he played Lord Lovat in The Longest Day, didn't he?
Another good man gone.
R.I.P.
Posted by: Kim du Toit | December 4, 2009 9:05 PM
My dad, a veteran of the US Navy in the Pacific, always swore that the British made the best war films and he particularly loved "The Dam Busters". (While "The Cruel Sea" may be just be the best war film ever made. Period.)
One reason might be that so many members of the casts of these films had served. George McDonald Fraser - who spent some time as a Hollywood scriptwriter in the Seventies - recounted in "The Hollywood History of the World" how he and the technical advisors (veterans to a man) could never make the modern cast look right to their eyes even though the umiforms and weapons were as perfect as the technical staff could make them. He finally concluded, you "just had to have been there" to have the right bearing, look on the face, inflection in the voice etc.
Fraser was also particularly complimentary to the British film industry 1940-1960 for "getting it right" in terms of all the little details to set the atmosphere of its war films.
Like all of GMF's work, the book is both an entertaining read and educational, covering how the Golden Age film industry in Britain and the US actually got it right more often than they got it wrong in their historical epics by using examples from some of his favorite films (and GMF was in love with the costume drama).
Col Beausaber
PS: Loved this piece of film criticism of "Mrs Miniver" that GMF dropped into his review - "The best propaganda film ever made". The speaker? The Minister of Public Enlightment, Dr Josef Goebbels.
Posted by: Beausaber | December 4, 2009 9:44 PM
Up the Ox and Bucks!
Posted by: ScaleyBack B*stard | December 5, 2009 12:49 AM
Kim in the film he played his boss Major Howard.
Posted by: ajdshootist | December 5, 2009 10:38 AM
Loss of a famous former light infantryman who often attended the paasing out parades at Shrewsbury, a true Gent!
Posted by: TimC | December 5, 2009 6:39 PM
Todd played Major Howard who at one point addressed an actor playing Richard Todd...
Posted by: Fred | December 6, 2009 4:25 PM
Reference The Longest Day in which he played his boss Major Howard. There's a part of the film where he took a piece of paper from a junior officer replying "Thanks Toddy".
The stoutest of bulldogs gone to sleep.
Posted by: Witchfinder | December 6, 2009 9:20 PM
Yeah, wife's all-time favorite movie is "The Damn Busters".
Posted by: emdfl | December 7, 2009 3:48 AM
I saw 'The Longest Day.' I have yet to see 'Dam Busters,' so will put that on the list. RIP, sir.
Posted by: Cricket | December 7, 2009 10:20 PM