LOL additional – shows how much I’d given up even looking for this movie in the right places – it is now available on DVD, so apologies for bitching about the rights owners … I still got it cheaper from eBay, that’s what counts lol

Finally got hold of a nice digital copy of this – so stupid of me ditching all my VHS including this all those years ago assuming it’d be easy to find again; I don’t think it’s been on TV yet this millennium, grr, and the eBay auctions have been equally sparse, never coming close to as low a price I finally got it for this week.

This is an even more beautiful movie than I remember – you know exactly how dedicated the film makers are when you see the year – 1952 – coupled with the credit “advice on the tuition of the deaf” on the opening scroll. It’s by far the smartest “old” movie I’ve ever seen, so ahead of its time it even beat the first dramatic adaptation of Helen Keller’s story by 5 years. Just watch the sublimely subtle way the headmistress of the school gestures at Jack Dawkins’ Searle to look at her when he’s speaking during a meeting, and her growing frustration at the others who don’t. It leaves you better than any movie I’ve seen with this heightened awareness of what people with disabilities have to put up with – like, even during the movie I watched after this, I was looking at peoples’ lips and realising how often it’s really impossible to follow what someone is saying without the sounds they’re making. There’s this fantastic visual motif in the movie of people with their backs turned on people – every time you see it it carries some significance, right from the first use of it with the overwhelmingly touching reveal about the headmistress.

But all this intelligence and consideration doesn’t mean the movie isn’t full of heart too. Another visual motif is that of the camera simply tracking in on Mandy’s face, often coupled by the sound fading out, that face often streaming with tears; her confusion is profoundly communicated to us in this way. The movie is so good overall that I’d completely forgotten how adorable Mandy Miller was here, let alone the performance she gives which is so beautiful and real I still find myself checking up online whether she actually was deaf (she wasn’t – you might know her better as the voice singing “Nelly the Elephant” hehe ) Those frowning, curious eyes staring silently over the wall at the other kids playing, it’s just one of the most moving images I’ve ever seen.

There’s the sharp, almost brassy humour of the best friend of Mandy’s mother, too – again remembering this is the early Fifties (note the solicitor’s scene: “Striking a woman is always a mistake – heaven knows they often ask for it but the courts take a dim view,” lol) – fearlessly putting Searle in his place, “I’ve already told her you’ve got no manners so you’ve no need to demonstrate it, now get on with it and show her around!” lol. In this frank talk and the whole issue of the broken family rearing its head towards the end of the movie, again the movie is just years ahead of anything else I’ve seen from the time.

The acting ensemble is all-round perfect. It’s easy to focus on the child’s performance in a movie like this, but Mandy Miller’s is really just the center of a whirlwind of talent on display here. If the end credits aren’t a little obscured by your tears, you should probably get your ducts checked I’ve seen a ton of the better known Ealing productions but this one remains by far the best in my opinion. Anyone involved with children – parents, teachers, whatever – could really learn a lot from this movie, the deaf thing doesn’t even come into it, if you’ve a child in your life you owe it to yourself and them to seek this one out, and anyone with the power practically has a duty to make it widely available again.