The Charge of the Light Brigade (British Film Guides) [Paperback]

FILM Magazine: "Mark Connelly has written a splendid book which examines the film and its production history with a fine tooth comb, and which kept me occupied for days. I highly recommend it." 'The BFG's all adhere to a common structure- a feature that differentiates them from the British Film Institute's rather less consistent Film Classics series- that focuses on the production and reception histories of the films as well as detailed analyses of their narrative and visual style... Connelly is at his best in his contextual analysis of the film. He uses a wide range of primary sources, including contemporary press materials and interviews with surviving personnel to chart the long and troubled production history of the film.' -James Chapman, Film International/Filmhaftet

Tony Richardson's 1968 "Charge of the Light Brigade", with its star cast, lavish sets and location shoots, was one of the most expensive British films ever made. Mark Connelly examines the film, its production, the role of its stars David Hemmings, Vanessa Redgrave and John Gieldgud, and director Richardson's running feud with the press and the film's subsequent fame. He shows the film to be representative of its time, in its visual style and its use of 60s themes, to discuss how "Charge of the Light Brigade", while meticulously reconstructed from authentic sources, reveals the horror of war to a world struggling to come to terms with American involvement in Vietnam.

Mark Connelly is Reuters Lecturer in Media History at the University of Kent and the author of Christmas: A Social History, and Christmas at the Movies (both I.B.Tauris)