William Golding’s famous dystopian novel about the breakdown of society along class lines, refracted through the story of kids marooned on a desert island, is a staple of high school curricula surely everywhere; it certainly was for me growing up, along with George Orwell’s Animal Farm, so I often get the two confused. Maybe that’s just because there’s a character called Piggy (here played by bespectacled Hugh Edwards, in a caricature of the intelligentsia), but in any case the film adaptation quickly focuses on the relationship between the two dominant boys, Ralph (James Aubrey) and Jack (Tom Chapin). The former is keen to ensure the rule of order in the common interest, while Jack soon stalks off to found his alternative society based on principles of self-interest and aggression. It’s all very beautifully shot by Tom Hollyman, a photographer rather than a cinematographer, and it gets to the core of Golding’s novel I think. However, as a film, it’s still very clearly just a group of public school brats run amok on a desert island, and your tolerance for that may affect how much you enjoy it.
FILM REVIEW: Criterion Collection
Director/Writer Peter Brook (based on the novel by William Golding) | Cinematographer Tom Hollyman | Starring James Aubrey, Tom Chapin, Hugh Edwards | Length 92 minutes || Seen at a friend’s home (DVD), London, Sunday 12 July 2015
