In search of the locations for Lindsay Anderson’s If….

Few images capture the tempestuous spirit of the late 1960s as effectively as actor Malcolm McDowell firing a sub-machine gun from the rooftops of a boarding school in Lindsay Anderson’s astonishing film If…. (1968). In spite of being only the second feature for the critic turned director, after This Sporting Life (1963), If…. reverberated through cinema with its effective blend of satire, surrealism and revolutionary spirit. Anderson’s film chimed heavily with the period’s upheavals, winning him the Palme d’Or at Cannes in 1969, while McDowell’s performance even caught the attention of a certain Stanley Kubrick who later cast the actor in A Clockwork Orange (1971) because of his role here as Mick Travis.

If…. follows the growing rebellion of a group of ‘Crusaders’ in a public school. Returning for the new term, a group of older pupils, led by Mick (McDowell), begin to rebel against the authority of the ‘Whips’ led by Rowntree (Robert Swann). Combined with the tyranny of the teachers and the ineffectual naivety of the headmaster (Peter Jeffrey), the Crusaders continue to push against the school’s array of rules and arbitrary rituals, eventually earning Mick and fellow Crusaders Johnny (David Wood) and Wallace (Richard Warwick) a caning. However, this is the final straw before the surreal rebellion – haunted by the unusual presence of The Girl (Christine Noonan) who walks through the lives of the Crusaders like a ghost – builds to an astonishingly violent climax.

Anderson’s film captured the tumultuous, violent mood of the late 1960s, blending its feverish desire for rebellion with a deeply English strain of surrealism. Yet, the film contrasts this spirit with the genteel setting of the English boarding school and its picturesque architecture. It may be one of the most effective school settings captured on celluloid, no doubt helped by the fact that Anderson was himself an old boy of the real college used for filming. 

Here are five locations from If…. as they stand today.

Much of Anderson’s film is shot in and around Cheltenham in Gloucestershire. Though most of the location filming occurs around the school, which is also in Cheltenham, fragments of the town are seen throughout. When Mick and Johnny escape the school, they are first seen near a roundabout. This is the Montpellier roundabout just up the road from the school.

Anderson zooms in on the pair larking around as they cross the road and on to the roundabout. Today, the building seen in the background is no longer a chemist but is still standing and recognisably the same.

Moving on from the roundabout, Mick and Johnny walk past a series of shops. These were on Cheltenham High Street and have changed dramatically. The True Form shop seen was roughly around 168 High Street though finding the exact building is difficult today.

Moving further down the street, the pair conduct an imaginary sword fight outside a clothes shop. As the reflection shows some of the buildings on Pitville Street, this marks out the building as being where the Monsoon shop is today.

Before these shots, a strange montage of other shops is shown. The shot below, showing a period clothes shop, also has a reflection of Pitville Street in the windows, showing the now closed H. Samuel and marking the modern location as being where the Santander bank sits today on the High Street.

Anderson does something unusual in this same sequence. In seconds, we are transported from Cheltenham’s High Street to west London, specifically Wimbledon and a motorbike shop. The shop was on Kingston Road and has since been demolished.

In spite of the shop’s demolition, its location can be pinpointed thanks to the view out of the shop’s window showing Kingston Road and the start of Gladstone Road. Today, most of the terrace houses have been demolished but the distinctive corner-shop seen in the shot advertising Watneys Beer is still standing.

In spite of using a handful of locations outside of the school setting, most of the film was shot in the college and its surrounding buildings. While some interiors for the college were shot at Carew Manor School in Beddington, the vast majority of the location filming took place at the beautiful Cheltenham College. The school, its buildings and its vast playing field, College Field, is the first location the viewer sees when the title sequence rolls.

A later, more detailed shot of the college from the playing field shows the school in a more distinctive winter light. This shot shows the college’s dining hall on the left and the chapel on the right.

Anderson shoots the playing field at various points during the film, though only once from the perspective of the college itself; specifically from the Chapel Quad. As a group of lads in military attire parade past, we see the playing field again, this time allowing for better views of the college’s pavilion.

Anderson made extensive and innovative use of Cheltenham College’s exteriors, sometimes using it naturally as it stood, at other times creating interesting illusions to expand its spaces. The following shot shows the doorway to the chapel and is very much an example of shooting the location as it was.

When the headmaster takes the Whips on a walk, they meander alongside the college’s dining hall, which is again as it was.

Anderson pays particular attention to the textures of the college’s buildings and windows, using them as unusual motifs throughout – less as scene-setting devices and more to create a sense of the college’s pervading oppressiveness. This shot of a window, for example, fulfils such a function, and is the window of one of the college’s theatres, known as Big Classical.

Of course, the college plays a role in the film’s famous final sequence involving a visit from military old boy General Denson (Anthony Nicholls) being disrupted by the Crusaders and their violent bid for revolution. The sequence opens with the arrival of Denson in his car. This shot shows the building that is now the Upper College Common Room.

After the attendees of the ceremony have been smoked out, the Crusaders flee the building. The opening they come out of is a walkway connecting to other parts of the college as well as an entrance way to the Upper College Common Room.

When the Crusaders open fire, General Denson tries to rally the boys and the other dignitaries, organising and arming them. He is seen sheltering behind a car and barking orders. The shot is very distinctive as it is filmed next to a plaque commemorating a patron of the real college.

As the fire-fight reaches its conclusion, Anderson plays fast and loose with the space of this square. In this shot, undoubtedly filmed from the upper windows of the college’s Centenary Block, the perspective creates the illusion that the Crusaders are facing their enemies. As it turns out, the rooftops used for the close-ups of the Crusaders are those of the Upper College Common Room: the building actually behind the soldiers and other students in this shot.

To prove the point, here is the distinctive rooftop of the Upper College Common Room which Mick and the others fire down from. This is also where the final shot is filmed, when McDowell fires his way through the fourth wall into British cinematic history.

Thanks to Cheltenham College. Visits to the site should not be undertaken without permission.

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O Dreamland: Lindsay Anderson’s Dark British Cinema runs at BFI Southbank in May.