This film is part of Free
Happy Family
Summer 1939, and an ordinary family gets an alarming taste of war to come in this little-known Ealing Studios propaganda short.
Overview
"It's about time we were brought to our senses!" A complacent family (plus a young John Mills) is taught a frightening lesson in this WWII propaganda short from Ealing Studios, which gives a strong taste of public disbelief that another war would really come. Released in June 1939, three months before Britain declared war on Hitler's Germany, Happy Family was commissioned by the Ministry of Information with the aim of preparing the British people for a war that was already feeling inevitable.
John Mills plays eager young enlistee Fred, the kind of role he would perform repeatedly during the war years. He plays a similar character in David Lean's This Happy Breed (1944), which shares with Happy Family a slightly soapy, everyman family setting. Though Lean's film was released five years later, the Noel Coward stage play from which it was adapted was - coincidentally - in development around the same time as Happy Family's release (though it wasn't performed until 1942). Happy Family was the first of around 30 short propaganda films made at Ealing during the war.
Related
Tim Marches Back Tim Marches Back
Government sponsored film 1944 2 mins
A Peter Strausfeld animation, encouraging the public to use the telephone more sparingly in wartime.
Ships with Wings (Film Trailer) Ships with Wings (Film Trailer)
Promotional 1941 2 mins
A trailer for Ealing's wartime drama "Ships with Wings", an all-star actioner about the Navy's Fleet Air Arm.
The Man in Grey (Film Trailer) The Man in Grey (Film Trailer)
Promotional 1943 3 mins Silent
Gainsborough melodrama trailer, starring the most desirable cast of the period.
The Silent Village The Silent Village
Government sponsored film 1943 36 mins Location: Cwmgiedd
The villagers of Cwmgiedd re-enact a Nazi massacre in Czechoslovakia, in Humphrey Jennings’ unforgettable propaganda film.
Fear and Peter Brown Fear and Peter Brown
Documentary 1940 16 mins
Terror on the home front - literally - in this heady and eccentric brew.
U.S. And Us U.S. And Us
Advert 1943 2 mins
An American G.I. learns how to brew a proper English cuppa in this jolly wartime ad for Maypole tea.
Getting it Back: The Story of Cymande - Q&A Getting it Back: The Story of Cymande - Q&A
Inside Film 2024 22 mins
The director of a documentary about British funk pioneers Cymande joins the band at BFI Southbank to talk about the film.
The West Case The West Case
Action and Adventure 1923 28 mins Silent Location: Tilbury
Plotting world domination, Devil Doctor Fu-Manchu steals plans for a new aero-torpedo in this earliest surviving thrill-a-minute serial instalment.
Enter the Scala!!! Enter the Scala!!!
Inside Film 2024 16 mins
Filmmakers Jane Giles and Ali Catterall discuss their documentary Scala!!!, revisiting the legendary and inspirational cinema venue and some of the most notorious films that screened there.
Smith Smith
Charity appeal 1939 10 mins
Long thought lost, this Powell-directed promotional short for a veteran’s charity was only rediscovered in 2003.
An Airman's Letter to His Mother An Airman's Letter to His Mother
Documentary 1941 6 mins
A poignant, stirring letter from a recently deceased pilot to his mother is read by John Gielgud.
The NHS75 Celebration The NHS75 Celebration
Short documentary 2023 3 mins
Former Bristol Poet Laureate, Miles Chambers reads a poem specially commissioned for the 75th anniversary of the NHS.