''Sword of Honour'' is a 2001 British television film directed by Bill Anderson and starring

Daniel Craig Daniel Wroughton Craig (born 2 March 1968) is an English-American actor who gained international fame playing the secret agent James Bond in the film series, beginning with '' Casino Royale'' (2006) and in four further instalments, up to '' ...

. Scripted by William Boyd, it is based on the ''

Sword of Honour The ''Sword of Honour'' is a trilogy of novels by Evelyn Waugh which loosely parallel Waugh's experiences during the Second World War. Published by Chapman & Hall from 1952 to 1961, the novels are: ''Men at Arms'' (1952); ''Officers and Gentl ...

'' trilogy of novels by

Evelyn Waugh Arthur Evelyn St. John Waugh (; 28 October 1903 – 10 April 1966) was an English writer of novels, biographies, and travel books; he was also a prolific journalist and book reviewer. His most famous works include the early satires ''Decli ...

, which loosely parallel Waugh's own experiences in the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

Reception

Commenting in ''

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a national British daily broadsheet newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed across the United Kingdom and internationally. It was fo ...

'', its Defence Editor,

John Keegan Sir John Desmond Patrick Keegan (15 May 1934 – 2 August 2012) was an English military historian, lecturer, author and journalist. He wrote many published works on the nature of combat between prehistory and the 21st century, covering land, ...

, said: "To reduce Waugh's enormous text to a short television treatment presented William Boyd with a daunting challenge. He has met it magnificently... Boyd's compressions improve Waugh's plot. At the literary level, therefore, Boyd passes all the tests. The failure is at the directorial level. Bill Anderson has either simply not grasped or has flinched from depicting how utterly different the Britain of 1939–45 is from Tony Blair's. His lack of grasp or nerve has affected his actors – though some of them may also be guilty of not having immersed themselves in the books, inexcusably, since Waugh is the most readable of novelists. As a result, characters appear either as caricatures or as pale approximations of Waughian realities".

Filming locations

Edinburgh was one of the locations for filming.

References

External links

* 2001 television films 2001 films British television films Films based on British novels Films based on works by Evelyn Waugh Films shot in Edinburgh Films with screenplays by William Boyd (writer) British World War II films 2000s English-language films {{UK-tv-film-stub