In Which We Serve (1942) on Netflix
In 1939 the Royal Navy commissions the destroyer HMS Torrin under Captain E. V. Kinross. Off Crete, German bombers hit the ship and the crew takes to a life raft.
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Trailer
Plot summary
Captain E. V. Kinross takes command of the destroyer HMS Torrin as Britain prepares for war and trains the crew who will sail her. After a quiet Christmas in Scottish waters, the ship fights at Narvik, where a torpedo strikes and dive bombers harry her on the tow back to port. On leave, Ordinary Seaman Shorty Blake meets Freda on a train; she is a relative of the Torrin's chief petty officer, Walter Hardy, and Blake must go back to sea. The destroyer joins the Dunkirk evacuation. In 1941, during a night action off Crete, German bombers cripple the ship, and the men who reach a life raft recall the years they have spent aboard her.
Cast
- Derek Elphinstoneas No. 1
- Robert Sansomas Guns
- Chimmo Bransonas Midshipman
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about In Which We Serve (1942)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- During In Which We Serve, William Hartnell was sacked from the role of Albert Fosdike, Shorty Blake's brother-in-law, after arriving late for his first day of shooting. Noël Coward made him personally apologize to cast and crew before dismissing him, and first-assistant director Michael Anderson took over the part.
SPOILER
For Captain Kinross's closing speech to the survivors in Alexandria, Noël Coward used the real speech that Lord Louis Mountbatten gave to the surviving crew of HMS Kelly after they were rescued and taken to Egypt.- Noël Coward was determined to play Captain Kinross in In Which We Serve even though the studio worried his public "dressing gown and cigarette-holder" persona would make audiences struggle to accept him as a tough navy man.
- After losing Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay at the 1943 Academy Awards to Casablanca and Princess O'Rourke, In Which We Serve still brought Noël Coward an Academy Honorary Award for his outstanding production achievement.
