Britannia Hospital (1982)

Britannia Hospital is not preparing for a visit from Queen Elizabeth1, who died in 1603. The visitor is a fictional representation of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother.

Director:

Lindsay Anderson

Writer:

David Sherwin

Stars:

Leonard Rossiter, Malcolm McDowell, Brian Pettifer

1 win & 3 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Leonard Rossiter	...	Vincent Potter: Administration
Brian Pettifer	...	Biles: Administration
John Moffatt	...	Greville Figg: Administration
Fulton Mackay	...	Chief Superintendant Johns: Administration
Vivian Pickles	...	Matron: Administration
Barbara Hicks	...	Miss Tinker: Administration
Graham Crowden	...	Professor Millar: Medicos
Jill Bennett	...	Dr. MacMillan: Medicos
Peter Jeffrey	...	Sir Geoffrey: Medicos
Marsha A. Hunt	...	Nurse Amanda Persil: Medicos (as Marsha Hunt)
Catherine Willmer	...	Dr. Houston: Medicos
Mary MacLeod	...	Casualty Sister: Medicos
Joan Plowright	...	Phyllis Grimshaw: The Unions
Robin Askwith	...	Ben Keating: The Unions
Dave Atkins	...	Sharkey: The Unions

Storyline

Mick Travis (Malcolm McDowell) is a reporter who is about to shoot a documentary on Britannia Hospital, an institution which mirrors the downsides of British Society. It's the day when Her Royal Highness Queen Elizabeth I is to visit the hospital to inaugurate a new wing, where advanced (and sinister) scientific experiments led by Professor Millar (Graham Crowden) will take place. Everybody in the hospital, from the cooks who refuse to cook, to the painters who couldn't care less to get their job done, to an African cannibalistic dictator (à la Idi Amin Dada Oumee) who demonstrators want expelled from the hospital and tried, will contribute to making Her Royal Highness Queen Elizabeth I's visit (and Mick Travis' life) a true nightmare.

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Plot Keywords:

workers' strike | hospital | frankenstein's monster | british renaissance | ignorance | 

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Taglines:

Will they ever recover ... ?

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Genres:

Comedy | Sci-Fi

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Certificate:

R

Details

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Release Date:

27 May 1982 (UK)

Also Known As:

Anderson's Britannia Hospital

Filming Locations:

Lee International Studios, Wembley, London, England, UK

Company Credits

Production Co:

British Lion Film Corporation, EMI Films, Film and General Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

116 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Britannia Hospital is so described in the movie as having fifty-three wards and one thousand one hundred beds. It employs a nursing staff of over three thousand, and operates in the south-eastern catchment area of London. The medical facility hosts ninety thousand patients per year from a population of two and three quarter million.

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Goofs

At 48:09, the cameraman goes from looking at the officials at the table to looking at Millar between shots.

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Quotes

General Wetherby: I didn't have 50 years in India to end up bedding down with a lot of wogs!

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Crazy Credits

Fulton Mackay's character was billed as Chief Superintendant; the correct spelling is Superintendent.

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Connections

Referenced in The Big Box: The Body Shop (2010)

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Soundtracks

Rule Britannia
(uncredited)
Music by Thomas Augustine Arne and lyrics by James Thomson

User Reviews

Life is a comedy to those who think, a tragedy to those who feel!

"The absurdities of human behaviour as we move into the Twenty-first Century are too extreme - and too dangerous - to permit us the luxury of sentimentalism or tears. But by looking at humanity objectively and without indulgence, we may hope to save it. Laughter can help." Lindsay Anderson

Britannia Hospital, an allegory for what was transpiring in England at the time, was released in 1982, and is the final part of Lindsay Anderson's brilliant lose trilogy of films that follow the adventures of Mick Travis as he travels through a strange and sometimes surreal Britain. From his days at boarding school in If.... (1968) to his journey from coffee salesman to film star in O Lucky Man (1972), Travis' adventures finally come to an end in Britannia Hospital which sees Mick as an investigative reporter investigating the bizarre activities of Professor Miller, played by the always interesting Graham Crowden, whom he had had a run in with in O Lucky Man. Checkout the Pig Man scene (This is well before Seinfeld.)

As is usual with an Anderson film the acting, by a top notch cast, most of whom had been in the previous two, is uniformly good. It is professionally shot by Mike Fash, although his work doesn't have the same feel to it that Miroslav Ondricek brought to the proceeding instalments, and is well produced. All three films have recurring characters from each. Some of the characters from If...., that didn't turn up in O Lucky Man, returned for Britannia Hospital. The film was lambasted by the English critics on release, although Dilys Powell listed it as one of the films of the year.

From its opening scene where an elderly patient is left to die on a gurney to its final revelatory scene of Miller unveiling his greatest scientific achievement, the film is choc full of surprises. One character is played by a dwarf and another by a man in drag. Yet one of the more pleasant surprises is the performance of Robin Askwith as Ben Keating, the school bully from If...., Askwith's film debut. Keating has organised a strike by the kitchen staff in retaliation for Potter ordering sixty-five ambassador class lunches from Furtnums. Askwith handles his role with skill, making Keating quite a likable character.

Over the years Britannia Hospital, as with the other two, has been revaluated and is now considered another classic from the Anderson stable. I, as did Dilys Powell, could have told them this when I first saw it back in '82.