One great performance in a film is indeed a treat but two is something of a rarity. Ronald Neame's "Tunes of Glory" starred Alec Guinness and John Mills and they are both magnificent. I won't say these are career-best performances from either actor but they are great nevertheless. Guinness is the acting colonel of a Scottish regiment based in Edinburgh Castle who is being replaced by Mills, their styles of command as different as chalk and cheese. Guinness is lackadaisical and takes the soft approach while Mills is a martinet; a clash of wills is inevitable.
Neame was always a fine director if never quite an auteur but this may be his masterpiece. It's based on a James Kennaway novel and Kennaway himself did the screenplay and as well as Guinness and Mills there is a first-rate supporting cast, (Dennis Price, Duncan Macrae, Gordon Jackson, Kay Walsh as well as a young John Fraser and Sussanah York, making her screen debut). It's the kind of intelligent, 'adult' British picture popular at the time though this is still a cut above most and even without those two great performaces at the centre it would be exceptional. With them, it's something of a triumph.
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