1946: A Matter Of Life And Death

A Matter of Life and Death (Powell and Pressburger, 1946) 8/10

In their 1979 song "Heaven," New York quartet The Talking Heads cheekily summized that "Heaven, Heaven is a place, a place where nothing, nothing ever happens." Thirty-three years earlier in their film A Matter of Life and Death, the imaginative British duo of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger thought otherwise.

Flying across the English Channel in his damaged Lancaster Bomber, English pilot, poet and European historian Peter Carter (David Niven) realizes he is about to die. With his parachute destroyed and the rest of his crew either deceased or previously ejected, Carter eccentrically mutters his final words to June (Kim Hunter), an American radio operator stationed in England. As she weeps upon his hearing his words, Carter jumps into the icy waters below.

Arriving washed-up on a sandy shore manned by a naked boy herding goats, Carter assumes he is in heaven, only for the boy to remark that he is actually in England. Seeing June cycling across the beach, Peter runs to her and the pair begin to fall in love. But in Heaven, there is a problem. Conductor 71 (Powell and Pressburger regular Marius Goring) a French Revolutionary-cum-Angel was supposed to collect Carter upon his fall, but became bewilderingly lost in the thick wafts of English fog.

Appearing in a rose garden, Conductor 71 informs Peter of the rare mistake. Madly in love with June, the former pilot refuses to accept death and pleads for a trial to determine his fate; while June's friend Dr. Reeves (Powell and Pressburger alumni Roger Livesey) tries to diagnose Peter's plight through more scientific and rational terms.

Released in the United States as Stairway to Heaven, A Matter of Life and Death was concocted at the behest of the Ministry of Information. With Anglo-American relations straining after the war, the Ministry was keen to have a film that spoke of the "special friendship" the two nations have symbolically shared. Thus, Powell and Pressburger, who had created such notable wartime films as A Canterbury Tale and The 49th Parallel devised a story based upon a newspaper clipping of a pilot who had survived an escape from his downed plane sans parachute.

Ironically, the film product was criticized by reviewers and audiences of the time for being anti-British: a charge that was regularly utilized in reviews of Powell and Pressburger's wartime fare. Yet, what critics of the time mistook for lack of patriotism, today translates into a lack of jingoism. There are no images of the brave, heroic Briton. Instead, A Matter of Life and Death finds Powell and Pressburger pondering their familiar topical concerns about rationality, mental stability and exotic worlds.

Despite the film's emphasis on a world beyond, Heaven itself is often subjected to scrutiny. While the pair do not openly dismiss the existence of Heaven, they do call into question the omnipotent nature of Heaven. The afterlife in the film is imbued with Calvanist notions of predestination as a receptionist holds a list featuring the names and dates of each of the deceased. Conductor 71's mistake may have been the first in over a millenium, but his inability to find Peter hints at the possibility of Heaven as an imperfect world. Certainly there is a degree of truth to this delienation; after all Heaven's membership is compiled of flawed human beings.

Upon first entering Heaven, the receptionist notes that hierarchical barriers such as rank, sex and race are nullified here: all are equal. But as noted by Peter's trial, it is interesting to see how prejudice still exists in Powell and Pressburger's view of Heaven. The prosecutor in Peter's case is Abraham Farlan (Raymond Massey): the first American to be killed during the Revolutionary War. Farlan despises the British and composes a jury of individuals from supposedly similarly minded societies: colonial India, Boer War-era South Africa and early 20th century Ireland. Farlan's case is mostly constructed not from judicial arguments, but through cultural prejudices: arguing that a woman of "good American stock" would be culturally unable to love a whimsical Englishman.

Yet, the trial brings into question the rationality of the natural laws binding the two worlds. In Farlan's estimation, love is irrational and thus he is unable to support Carter's claim for a prolonged life. But, Carter and his attorney argue differently. Conductor 71's mistake allowed Carter to rationally fall in love with a woman, whom previously he would not have met under any other circumstances.

The existence of Heaven is established through the dichotomy between scientific rationalism and psychological irrationalism. The negating of time during his confrontations with Conductor 71 prevents individuals other than Carter in seeing these meetings occur. Due to Carter's previous history of head trauma, Dr. Reeves assumes that these visions could easily be hallucinations. Through surgery the doctor aims to correct this mental imbalance, while still involving his curiousity by inquiring to the nature of Carter's conversations with the Frenchman. Furthermore, Powell and Pressburger employ the same actor to play the Judge presiding over Carter's case and his brain surgeon.

Like other Powell and Pressburgers films like I Know Where I'm Going!, The Red Shoes, Tales of Hoffman and Black Narcissus, the notion of mental instability is progressed. In each of the latter films, this disproportion is the product of human emotions in a strange or foreign place. In I Know Where I'm Going! Wendy Hiller tries to marry a wealthy man on the Scottish island of Mull, but is surrounded by a group of colourful eccentrics, who along with Mother Nature persuade her to take an alternative route in life; both The Tales of Hoffman and The Red Shoes feature characters driven to the edge through romance in a foreign land; while Black Narcissus sees a group of nuns become fractured and instable in the Himalayas when their true sentiments and lusts are revealed.

The foreign nature of Heaven is related through Alfred Junge's modernist sets and Jack Cardiff's cinematography. Featuring open ampitheatres, white walls and an escalator, Heaven is a place detached from the warm colourful landscapes of Earth captured in Jack Cardiff's visuals. This is primarily acheived by Cardiff's utilization of both black and white and colour cinematography. Like in Victor Fleming's The Wizard of Oz, two colour techniques are utilized to distinguish two different worlds. Using harsh black and white to capture Heaven, the afterlife is filled with the type of cold and mechanical imagery later to be seen in 1950's Sci-Fi cinema; Earth on the otherhand is not as regimented and thus is filled with surreal imagery and hyperactive colour. Earth thus belongs to the cinematic spirit of Cocteau in its portrayal of the fantastic.

Featuring a strong cast including David Niven, Kim Hunter, Marius Goring and Roger Livesey, A Matter of Life and Death, A Matter Of Life and Death is one of the most interesting and complex British films of its ever. Utilizing fantastic sets by Alfred Junge and images by master cinematographer Jack Cardiff, Powell and Pressburger created one of the most memorable films of its era.

Although Hunter's performance is often annoying in its context as one of the duo's dependent female characters, her role is minimal. Additionally, the picture's Anglo-American legal duel during the film's last twenty minutes is often tedious and overwrought in its construction.Viewed a critical and commercial failure at the time of its release, A Matter Of Life and Death has emerged as one of the most important films of the 1940's: a magical and charming romantic-fantasy filled with delightful comic touches.

* A Matter of Life and Death is available on R2 DVD through Carlton Home Video.

Other Powell and Pressburger Films Reviewed:
Black Narcissus (1947) 10/10

Copyright 2007 8½ Cinematheque