All the King's Men

1999

1h 50m

IMDb RATING

6.2/10

YOUR RATING

Rate

POPULARITY

Play trailer

0 Videos

4 Images

Drama

War

Mystery

Feature-length drama about the mystery of Sandringham Company, which disappeared in action at Gallipoli in 1915. Commanded by Captain Frank Beck, their estate manager, the men advanced into battle, were enveloped in a strange mist and never seen again.

Directors

Julian Jarrold

Writers

Alma Cullen(writer by)

Nigel McCrery(novel by)

Stars

David Jason

Maggie Smith

William Ash

See production, box office & company info

Photos4

Top cast

Capt. Frank Beck

Queen Alexandra

Sgt. Ted Grimes

Lady Frances

2nd Lt. Frederick Radley

James Murray

Pvt. Will Needham

Ed Waters

Corporal Herbert Batterbee

Pvt. Chad Batterbee

Pvt. Davy Croft

Arthur Beck

Lieut. Alec Beck

Second Lieut. Evelyn Beck

King George V

Peggy Batterbee

Oswald Yeoman

Capt. Claude Howlett

Queen Mary

Mary Beck

Directors

Julian Jarrold

Writers

Alma Cullen(writer by)

Nigel McCrery(novel by)

All cast & crew

Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

User reviews1

Review

Featured review

6/10

As the grandchildren of Queen Victoria all squared up against each other at the start of the Great War, and as the once powerful Ottoman Empire finally shut up shop, the staff at King George V’s Norfolk Residence at Sandringham formed their own regiment determined to train and do their part for the war effort. They are led by the fastidious estate manager “Beck” (David Jason) and with the blessing of their royal patron, Queen Alexandra (a rather unremarkable performance from Dame Maggie Smith) set off to the Turkish sphere of operations where incomplete history tells us they were in involved in the perilous and somewhat disastrous Gallipoli campaign. This story is told from a perspective of a search, instigated by the Queen, into just what did happen and there is a familiar collection of faces used to deliver a story of courage and of, frankly, enthusiastic ineptitude at just about every level. David Jason is what we in Britain call a “National Treasure” but mainly as a comedy actor. Here, he seemed rather miscast and for me he failed to really ignite this formidable character as he becomes more of a parody of the stiff upper lip mentality than an exponent of it. It was made by the BBC and though they have clearly thrown considerable resource at this, it still looks and feels like a television movie with little by way of grand-scale illustrative photography of the battle scenes or the scale of the operations, and it’s grasp of the horrors of war is just a little too tepid to deliver poignantly enough. That said, it’s still a good looking drama that tells an interesting story that could also probably be applied to so many towns and villages across the land who cobbled together their own troops of the ill-prepared, the frightened and the patriotic to go and fight a war about which they knew virtually nothing for officers who had quite possibly all but inherited their commands, and who didn’t know a great deal more.

Geronimo196719 Mar, 2025