Will Hay started his performing career in the music halls, as a comedy schoolmaster who is (of course) outsmarted by his schoolboys. Well before Abbott and Costello wondered Who's on First, Will Hay was doing a routine about a schoolboy named Howe in Wye from Ware.
In his film career, Will Hay -- no relation to the American film censor Will Hays -- usually played minor authority figures (a schoolmaster, a stationmaster, a fire chief) who were incompetent, stupid and usually crooked with it. In real life, Will Hay was something of an intellectual. An amateur astronomer of some real significance, he discovered the White Spot on Saturn and a few other items.
Hay was the perfect choice to star in 'Go to Blazes', an extremely interesting oddity from the dark days of the Blitz. This film cleverly manages to be a genuinely funny comedy, an instructional film, and a propaganda piece (assuring Britons to stay brave and calm) all at the same go.
Hay plays a harried husband who comes home to discover his daughter (Thora Hird, a bit too big for her gymslip) studying conic sections. As there's a firewatch in progress, he boasts of his prowess in extinguishing incendiary bombs. We see Hay in action, in flashback: of course, he's bang incompetent. I laughed heartily as an incendiary on Hay's roof proceeds to burn its way down through each storey of his house, eventually settling in the cellar.
It's no surprise, of course, that a genuine incendiary arrives ... and it's also no surprise that Hay's wife and daughter are cool and confident as they extinguish it, while Hay has no idea of what to do. There's a very British closing gag.
I found this short film absolutely fascinating, not merely for its content but also its context: civilians in wartime Britain were being killed in their own homes by German bombs. 'Go to Blazes', in addition to instructing the public on how to protect themselves, also serves as propaganda to assure them that the situation isn't so hopeless after all. This very funny film is black comedy in the true sense of that term, as audiences were encouraged to laugh at a truly lethal situation which could kill them at any moment. Shortly after 'Go to Blazes' was released, most cinemas and theatres in wartime London were shut down: the Home Office wanted to avoid the danger to homefront morale that would result if a doodlebug hit a theatre with hundreds of people in it.
'Go to Blazes' rates a full 10 out of 10. It's hilarious, and it's more relevant than ever in this post-9/11 age.
