Boy, that film escalated on me at the very end. I'm watching it as a comedy and it does have some funny lines and happenings but the end turned it into something else for me. Whitnail and I is really sort of bleak in terms of what happens between friends when one of them moves on or makes it good in life and the other doesn't. The film title itself tells you that its from the perspective of "I", Whitnail and I. Obviously, at its heart, its a comedy but that ending, that god damned ending did something to me.
Generally when I watch films for the club I pay close attention to the props of the film, the artwork, posters, grafitti, books or magazines, obscure references, anything that will give me insight into what is really being said and directors almost always put these things in, even if subtle at times. About halfway through the film, "I" is reading a book that flashes on screen, clearly readable as Journey's End by R.C. Sheriff. Journey's end was published in 1929.
Journey's End was also a 3 act play of the same name in 1929 starring Colin Clive and directed by James Whale, you may notice the bottle of booze sitting on the table next to Clive.
Some variants of the book also have bottles of liquor on the table by a skull.
The book is about several men's experiences in an officers dugout during WWI and takes place over a period of 4 days. Whitnail and I also seems to be about their journey, including an incredible amount of alcohol, and takes place over what appears to be 3 or 4 days. R.C. Sheriff considered called the book "Waiting" or "Suspense" but ended up calling it Journey's End which was from a line in an unidentified book.
It didn't occur to me that the end of the film was going to turn the way it did but after researching it some I think its far more brilliant than just a comedy about a couple of alcoholics misadventures. This is from a synopsis of Act 3 of Journey's End.
The German attack on the British trenches approaches, and the Sergeant Major tells Stanhope they should expect heavy losses. When it arrives, Hibbert is reluctant to get out of bed and into the trenches.
A message is relayed to Stanhope telling him that Raleigh has been injured by a shell and that his spine is damaged meaning that he can't move his legs. Stanhope orders that Raleigh be brought into his dugout. He comforts Raleigh while he lies in bed. Raleigh says that he is cold and that it is becoming dark; Stanhope moves the candle to his bed and goes deeper into the dugout to fetch a blanket, but, by the time he returns, Raleigh has died. The shells continue to explode in the background. Stanhope receives a message that he is needed. He gets up to leave and, after he has exited, a mortar hits the dugout causing it to collapse and entomb Raleigh's corpse.
Whitnail = Raleigh
"I" = Stanhope
Notice how Raleigh complains of being cold, just as Whitnail did. Stanhope ("I") stays with him as long as he can but Raleigh dies and Stanhope ends up leaving the dugout as it is destroyed by a bomb, entombing Raeigh. The end of Whitnail and I is a deadly death-strike to Whitnail, if not just the death of their friendship, the actual death of Whitnail that awaits him. He is an alcoholic, being evicted from his apartment, has no future, no money, and now his best friend "I" has moved on with his life, cutting his hair and moving on to something else.
"I" even tells Whitnail, I'm going to miss you. He and Whitnail know that this is the Journey's End. I enjoyed the comedy aspect of this film but in no way was prepared for the final 5 or 10 minutes.