Hope and Glory (1987)

War is a wheeze for a nine-year-old boy in suburban London during the Blitz in Boorman's whimsical, funny, nostalgic semi-autobiographical memoir. Strong performances, especially from the young leads, make it a delightful movie despite some episodic qualities and minor quibbles with eccentric portrayals.

Boorman's autobiographical film about family life during the Blitz is subversively light on the blood, sweat, tears and sacrifice, and a joy throughout. It communicates the affectionate poetry of a long-lost England through the eyes of a nine-year-old seeing the war as a wonderland of fireworks and adventure playgrounds.

John Boorman's semi-autobiographical story of a young boy growing up in wartime Britain is more of an idealised remembrance than a historical snapshot. The streets are convincingly evocative of the period but there is little to none of the regular horrors that citizens had to face, with the film showing twee leanings aside from its warmth.

The critic calls the film brilliantly evocative and warmly comic, shifting the point of view to a 7-year-old boy for whom the war is liberation in its most glorious and frightening form. Boorman captures every contradictory nuance of the experience with an irresistible salute to women's strength and England's resilience.

Boorman has written a childhood autobiography on film that confirms him as the great risk-taking romantic of British cinema. The child's-eye view of family life during the Blitz paints an unexpectedly warm picture, blending domestic drama with surreal flashes.

The critic finds John Boorman's autobiographical film a radiant remembrance of World War II as seen through the eyes of a young boy who savors its adventure. It has an invitingly nostalgic spirit with a fine eye for magical details a child might notice.

The review describes the film as a collection of sweetly autobiographical anecdotes of English family life during World War II, narrated from a child's perspective. Best scenes center on the boy and show the unthinking callousness kids can display amid others' misfortune.