Queen and Country / COMPLETED

Synopsis

1952. Bill Rowan is 18, dreaming his life away at the family’s riverside home,
waiting to be called up for two years conscription in the Army. He swims each
morning and yearns for a pretty girl who cycles past at that time on the tow
path across the river. This idyll is shattered by the harsh realities of boot camp.
He meets Percy, an amoral prankster, and together they plot the downfall of
Sergeant Yeomans, their rigid tormentor. Percy and Bill are rivals and antagonists,
but gradually forge a deep friendship.
After basic training many conscripts are shipped out to fight the Chinese in the
Korean War, but Bill and Percy are assigned to the claustrophobia of a closed,
prison-like training camp where they act as instructors. The pressure is briefly
relieved by excursions into the outside world where Bill falls in love with the
wrong girl, but finds the right one in the end. Bill’s older sister returns from Canada
with her two children and the hard-headed Percy falls head over heels for her.
Finally, Bill is confronted with the shattered lives of wounded boys returning from
Korea.