Sailor — Season 1

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The pubs and clubs of Devonport's notorious Union Street are throbbing with laughter and life. Hundreds of sailors - out on a gaudy night ashore - drink away their last hours on home soil for six months. On the morning tide the largest ship in the fleet will thread her way out of the trickiest harbour in the land. The Captain of HMS Ark Royal and his Commander have a testing few hours ahead - a challenging exercise in navigation and the task of forging the sailors once more into a shipshape crew.As Ark inches into the open sea, the vice of naval discipline begins to bite...

A day out from Plymouth, and steaming into the Western Approaches, the last of the fixed-wing carriers prepares to take on her strike-force complement of Phantoms, Buccaneers, Sea Kings and Gannets, which are her shield and her sword.From the air the flight deck of HMS Ark Royal looks tiny, and some of the young pilots have never before touched down on a real aircraft carrier ...

Ark Royal is 21 years old. The cake is baked and iced: the messages of congratulations are pouring in. But one message is different. It's a mayday call from the Americans. Three hundred miles away somewhere in the Atlantic there is a sick sailor on a US nuclear submarine who may die of acute peritonitis, unless he can be airlifted away and operated upon quickly. The party is dropped and preparations for the ' casevac ' begin - a race against time.

Out in the Atlantic, cut off from wives, children and sweethearts, the ship's company awaits With suspense the first batch of mail. But two wives are actually within hailing distance of Ark Royal, passengers on one of the supply vessels that keep the great leviathan victualled. Meanwhile the crew set about some home entertainments. The star attraction is Ark TV personality Wilf, the ship's puppet-whose salty songs and sketches guarantee him high ratings and big audiences on board.

A banyan is navy slang for a beach party. The ship's chaplain has no illusions that after five strenuous weeks at sea, the run ashore to San Juan will result in lapses from grace that will eclipse the boisterousness of any banyan. With a tolerance that only a navy chaplain can have, this man of the cloth says: ' It's just a fact I accept. We're all frail human beings. What cheers me is the sailor's honesty with himself.'

'No young officer, who's any good, ever feels he's got enough responsibility. He reckons the silly old b ... s who are running the ship aren't half as good as he would be, if he were the boss. I think that's quite a healthy sign. It becomes unhealthy if he thinks there's nothing he can learn.' So says the Captain, the most senior officer aboard HMS Ark Royal, in a film which contrasts his thoughts and duties with those of the most junior sub-lieutenant in his care.

Despite the terrible nature of her primary role, a ship of war resembles a living theatre. There is the pride of blazing jets, a tableau vivant of sailors plotted in file around the flight deck as a marine band serenades them into a foreign port, and the unique comic relief of the ship's own concert. Such a presentation makes an aircraft carrier the biggest steel stage of all.

' Ark ' is berthed in Mayport. The crew have three weeks' rest and recreation. After two months at sea, every man jack is out for a good time. Disneyworld, the beach, the pool, the swinging clubs of Jacksonville are all favourite haunts. But the flight-deck handlers turn from pleasures of the flesh. Keen ornithologists, they bird-watch among the snakes and alligators of the Everglades.L/Steward Conway has crammed a wedding into his weeks. He leaves his new wife on the quay-side, as ' 'Ark' steams off under the benign eye of the local police chief, who gives the British sailor ten out of ten for good behaviour.

' Ark' is on her way back at last. No one was left behind. But it was a near thing, because two ratings had decided to fly home while ' Ark ' was in America, to be with their pregnant wives during their confinements. One has done it the Navy way - officially. But the other simply deserted. He jumped ship, and tried to work his passage back. Now he awaits Naval justice in the ship's cells. For the rest, it's mostly over - bar a lot of shouting. Ark Royal is in a holiday mood - and as if to symbolise the joie de vivre, the Captain, Commander and Met Officer don pigtails and skirts, join hands and dance ...

When the sailor changes from his bell-bottoms to his flared jeans, his psyche changes too. Gone is the rover, taken over by domesticated man. ' Ark' is docked and lifeless as its crew disperses into the lap of families ashore-the Fleet Chief, Tom Wilkinson , scourge of ratings, to a loyal dog and a loving wife; Capt Graham - man of decision - to the minutiae of life in his Surrey village; and L/S ' Twinkle ' Powell - ladies' man of the Spanish Main - to his mother whom he festoons with gifts. Only those without families carry on the enduring and endearing traditions and pursuits of sailors of all generations.