Night Mail

I really expected to devour 1936's short film NIGHT MAIL, from directors Harry Watt and Basil Wright.  I've long been fascinated by the postal service and even took the civil service exam in my twenties, ready to assume (after other pursuits did not pan out) what I considered a stable occupation.  That did not come to pass, but I still often thought on the precise methods used to sort and deliver parcel.  A dance of organization I could envy, as I've never been the most organized or administrative type myself.  I learned about this English documentary on Letterboxd, which I have credited with vastly expanding my film knowledge, especially of much older titles.

The narration explains the nightly postal train that runs from London to Glasgow.  An initially quite profitable enterprise.  This train carries no paying passengers but rather dedicated workers who trade small talk as they carefully route letters and retrieve mailbags that are snatched from a metal arm at stations along the route.  Most of the film was shot on locations along the tracks, though train interiors were recreated in a studio, with the actors (many real workers) directed to simulate train movement by swaying.  Some highly dramatic shots were achieved aerially.  The camera work is stunning.

But the film was curiously tedious to me.  Lacking somehow.   Maybe I wanted a bit more detail about the process, and more narration to that end.  There are plenty of night shots of the train pressing on, but as impressive as they are, didn't achieve the sort of railway poetry I expected.  Strangely enough, this is despite the use of W.H. Auden's "verse commentary" (scored by Benjamin Britten!), a sort of rap if you will, about the London, Midland, and Scottish Railway.  Once you hear it, you won't be able to get it out of your head.  Aphex Twin later sampled it.

I guess I'll create my own mental postal run.  NIGHT MAIL is highly acclaimed and was featured on TCM, but remains after a few viewings a somewhat blah curio for me.