This Happy Breed

"A Sweeping Panorama of Living"

1944 1h 51m EN

👍

7.1

SOLID

🔥

100%

CERTIFIED FRESH

⭐

7.3

IMDB

★7.1TMDB · 65🍅100%Rotten Tomatoes★7.3IMDB · 4,181

Drama

Synopsis

Spoiler shield

A chronicle of the lives of the Gibbons family, from shortly after the end of the First World War to the beginning of the Second.

“A Sweeping Panorama of Living”

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Where to watch · US

Criterion ChannelSubscription

Cast

Robert Newton
Frank Gibbons
Celia Johnson
Ethel Gibbons
Amy Veness
Mrs. Flint
Alison Leggatt
Aunt Sylvia
Stanley Holloway
Bob Mitchell
John Mills
Billy Mitchell
Kay Walsh
Queenie Gibbons
Eileen Erskine
Vi Gibbons

Credits

Behind the camera

Director: David Lean
Writers: Ronald Neame, David Lean, Anthony Havelock-Allan
Languages: English
Countries: United Kingdom

Want more? Switch to Cinephile mode in the header for DP, composer, budget, box office, production companies, keywords, and release history.

Did you know?

Fun facts 🍿

1 / 8

MONEY

Did you know

Shot for just $0.9M — micro-budget by Hollywood standards.

MoodPlayr · trivia#01

2 / 8

ERA

Did you know

82 years old — a genuine piece of film history.

MoodPlayr · trivia#02

3 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Directed by David Lean, shot by Ronald Neame. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.

MoodPlayr · trivia#03

4 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Original score by Clifton Parker. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.

MoodPlayr · trivia#04

5 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Editor Jack Harris shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.

MoodPlayr · trivia#05

6 / 8

CAST

Did you know

Robert Newton and Celia Johnson and Amy Veness carry the top of the cast.

MoodPlayr · trivia#06

7 / 8

FACT

Did you know

Marketing tagline: "A Sweeping Panorama of Living".

MoodPlayr · trivia#07

8 / 8

WILD

Did you know

IMDB entry: tt0037367 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.

MoodPlayr · trivia#08

Cinephile deep dive

The take

David Lean directs. Ronald Neame behind the camera. Clifton Parker scores. Jack Harris cuts. Produced in United Kingdom. Dialogue in English.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

1Shot for just $0.9M — micro-budget by Hollywood standards.
282 years old — a genuine piece of film history.
3Directed by David Lean, shot by Ronald Neame. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
4Original score by Clifton Parker. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
5Editor Jack Harris shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
6Robert Newton and Celia Johnson and Amy Veness carry the top of the cast.
7Marketing tagline: "A Sweeping Panorama of Living".
8IMDB entry: tt0037367 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
9Only 65 TMDB ratings — you're getting ahead of the curve on this one.
10Classified under 13 themes, including "london, england", "strike", "war veteran", "cafe".

The technical file

Cinematography: Ronald Neame
Original score: Clifton Parker
Editing: Jack Harris
Makeup / hair: Tony Sforzini
Runtime: 111 min · 1h 51m
Status: Released
Budget: $900,000
Original language: EN
Certification (US): PG
IMDB: This Happy Breed (1944)
Rotten Tomatoes: 100% 🍅 Fresh
IMDB rating: 7.3/10 · 4,181 votes
MPAA: Not Rated

Awards

1 win

Also by

David Lean

Trailers & featurettes

Watch the pieces

Community reviews

What people are saying

CinemaSerf2022-06-30
★ 7/10
This gently entertaining film follows the trials and tribulations of the "Gibbons" family - mum, "Ethel" (Celia Johnson), dad "Frank" (Robert Newton), daughters "Queenie" (Kay Walsh), "Vi" (Eileen Erskine) and their son "Reg" (John Blythe) alongside her mother "Mrs. Flint" (Amy Veness), who not untypically lodged with them too. There's is a simple enough life, contentedly living in a newly built suburbia with a garden, whilst their children grow to adulthood - going through the daily motions and routines familiar to all. To a large extent, that's what gives the film much of to charming potency. Each character has a storyline of their own, and the episodic nature of their evolution takes them through the stages of their developing lives succinctly. Tragedy strikes as often as happiness, but David Lean doesn't allow the stories to dwell on these incidents, nor to linger on any aftermath. Each chapter is effectively closed (or paused) and the timeline moves on - it's almost as if it's constructed in the way one might write it in a daily journal. The screenplay keeps a comedic theme at the film's heart - well aided by the likes of Stanley Holloway as next door neighbour "Bob" and Alison Leggatt as Johnson's histrionics prone sister "Sylvia"- as it offers us a social commentary of a time when the traditional British ways of life were adapting, or not, to post WWI necessity - and changing political attitudes. It starts with a celebration of the end of the Great war, with all the soldiers from the victorious nations parading through London, via the death of King George V through to the rumblings of WWII and the journey is poignant, at times profound and engaging. The personalities - especially Newton and Walsh mature wonderfully, if not exactly "maturely", and one cannot help but empathise with Johnson's stoic realism throughout the twenty years or so of their lives depicted here. The story is pedestrian in nature - and by design mimics day-to-day live in an authentic (they go from gas lamps to electricity, they even get a gramophone) fashion that exudes an honest validity. Slow at times, but never dull - a lovely, film to watch. The closing scene did make me wonder if they ought to have wallpapered a bit more often, though...

Production companies