Out of a job ... will the black Labrador
feature in Jackson's remake?
Photograph: Anja Kjellsson
The news that Peter Jackson is preparing a remake of The Dambusters seems tailor-made for a disapproving article in the Daily Mail and is therefore to be welcomed. Why oh why can't these pesky foreigners leave our British classics alone? Why oh why must our cherished history be re-written by a man best known for stuffing his movies with drippy elves and monster monkeys? Heaven knows what a King Kongified version of The Dambusters will look like. Will there still be a role for Nigger?
Despite Jackson's assurance that his movie will be 'as authentic as possible', I think it's safe to assume there won't. Nigger, if you recall, was the beloved black Labrador adopted as a mascot for the hardy men of Bomber Command Squadron 617. He played a pivotal role in the 1954 movie and his eventual demise (flattened by a car) has been compared to the death of Bambi's mum as one of the most traumatic moments in movie history. Yet Nigger (through no fault of his own) has since become an embarrassment for champions of the film; his very presence suggesting that these vaunted British heroes were actually no more than a bunch of bigots. "It wasn't a racist word back then," explains a nervous David Brent in an episode of The Office. Yet that didn't stop ITV from screening an edited, Nigger-free version of The Dambusters on TV a few years back.
So it will be interesting to see just how passionately Middle England will lobby for the dog to be included. Again, I'm betting that they let the matter drop. Recent evidence, after all, suggests that these defenders of British culture temper their ardent nostalgia with a quiet pragmatism. Enid Blyton may still be trumpeted as our greatest children's author, but the decision to remove the golliwogs from Noddy seemed to pass without protest. Ditto the decision to rename that famous Agatha Christie novel about the 10 little Indians. I still possess a childhood copy of a Just William book (first published in the 30s) in which William and his pals form a local branch of the Nazi party and start terrorising the local shopkeeper because he's Jewish. I'm betting you can't find that one in the shops these days.
There will inevitably be some that view these historical excisions as another example of political correctness gone mad (or at least mildly mentally ill). Others will view it as the sign of a living, healthy culture that is merely tidying up the mistakes of its past. Personally, I'm inclined to think that this process of airbrushing is OK when applied to children's fiction, but it turns more problematic when addressing actual documented history. It makes us feel that we are being bamboozled; spun a line; told the world was one way when it was actually another. These issues have now found a new lightning rod. It takes the form of a little dog that dare not speak its name.
