Movie London – Art Deco
I’m a big Ian McKellen fan. And his Richard III is, to my mind, one of the great Shakespearian performances.
But it’s also a wonderful guide to early 20th century building in London – the great days of Art Deco.
And what I think McKellen got absolutely right was the political ambivalence of this architecture. Take a good look at Shell Mex House in the picture above – doesn’t it look just a bit like something by Albert Speer? The assertiveness of this architecture, its super-human scale, make it just that little bit totalitarian.
And certainly, when these buildings were put up, they were completely out of kilter with the fabric of little old London. They shocked.
In the film, we do see some earlier buildings too. Richard’s private cinema is in fact the medieval great hall of Eltham Palace; and the Queen and her family take breakfast in what is really the undercroft of Lincoln’s Inn.
But it’s Art Deco that really stamps its style on the movie. The old Pearl Assurance building, now the Renaissance Chancery Court Hotel, is more classical in style, but the Senate House of the University of London is full-on Art Dec. And it has a real Fascist background that makes its use in the film almost ironic – Oswald Moseley apparently planned to hold his Parliament here when he took power, and it’s said Hitler intended to do the same.
Other shots include Bankside Power Station (aka Tate Modern), County Hall (the old one, not Ken’s curvaceous little number), St Pancras (a nod to the Victorian Gothic), and Horticultural Hall, Westminster – another striking piece of Art Deco design.
And the film ends with one of London’s great icons – Battersea Power Station providing the shell-trashed backdrop to a thoroughly modern war scene.
Even if you’re not normally the kind of person who’s into tracking down film locations, if you have the slightest interest in early 20c architecture in London, this film is well worth seeing.
As usual, I got my info from Tony Reeves’ book Movie London.
Photo credit – Dave Mackay on Flickr
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