Pacifist reflection The film visualizes the pacifist and monumental masterpiece (1962) of Benjamin Britten, one of the most significant English composers of the twentieth century. The majestic theme of the Catholic Mass of the Dead, appealing to feelings of mercy and understanding, is constantly interrupted here by candid intimate inserts of the poet Wilfried Owen, who was killed just days before the end of the First World War.
“Weeping for brotherly and sisterly love, not sexual love,” Jarman called the film, in a bold attempt to bring Britten’s musical reflection on war to the screen. Without changing his style of Baroque Mannerism, he turns to the theme of the death and collapse of civilization, demonstrates the horrors and cataclysms of the modern world, collecting them in a mosaic of images consisting of both documentary and game shots.
The result is something like a giant music video, where the image series is built according to the laws of both dramatic cinema and clip aesthetics. In such diverse poetics there is a magic, but not everyone is understandable. The majestic soundtrack united the voices of famous opera performers - Galina Vishnevskaya, Peter Pierce, Dietrich Fischer-Dishau. His last role - an old soldier wounded in the war and spent the rest of his life in the hospital - played here the great Lawrence Olivier.
The film brought together three names of the famous representatives of the sex minority - Owen-Britten-Jarman. The last of them worked on the film, not only knowing about his terrible diagnosis - HIV infection, but even informing the public about it. After the completion of this work, Jarman announced that he was leaving the film studio and would now live as a reclusive in his cottage in Dungenesse. He had 4 more years of life ahead of him.