It’s a Big New York Summer for Filmmakers Powell and Pressburger, and Film Forum Has the Gem

Working in conjunction with the British Film Institute, the Museum of Modern Art has geared up for summer by organizing a retrospective of a British filmmaking team, Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. Not to be outdone, the Quad Cinema will be presenting David Hinton’s documentary “Made in England: The Films of Powell & Pressburger,” in which Martin Scorcese provides a guided tour through their “grand, poetic, wise, adventurous, headstrong … deeply romantic, and completely uncompromising” corpus.As someone who’s always felt that Powell and Pressburber’s pictures crumple too readily under their highly manicured artifices, I think Film Forum has its priorities in order by presenting one — and only one — film by the duo: “The Small Back Room” (1949). This World War II story of a disabled scientist battling his demons, all the while navigating an under-the-cover love affair and a newfangled explosive device put into use by the Nazis, is among the most adult entertainments ever conceived. A failure at the box office upon its release, “The Small Back Room” has been blessed by retrospect. It is a perfect film.Well, it’s as perfect as any one thing can be. There is the scene in which Powell and Pressburger insert a flourish that is typical of the filmmakers in its hyperbole. Sammy Rice (David Farrar), the aforementioned scientist and an alcoholic, is considering taking a swig from the illicit bottle that he insists on keeping at hand. The internal struggle Rice undergoes breaks with the silky realism that Powell and Pressburger have established. Suddenly, we’re in the realm of “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari,” with Surrealist distortions of scale and canted Expressionistic angles. It’s a titter-worthy, cartoonish digression.Contrast that with the harrowing scene in which Rice falls off the wagon at the local watering hole. Here, Powell and Pressburger place their emphasis on a tense back-and-forth between our hero and a dutiful barkeep, “Knucksie” (Sid James). The latter is wise to Rice’s overindulgences and puts his foot down once inebriation sets in. The resulting contretemps is exquisitely paced and brilliantly acted, all the while pointing up the degree to which self-pity can enable self-abasement. The momentum continues after Rice stumbles home in a stupor, ultimately passing out on the settee. But then, of course, the phone rings…. .Kathleen Bryon and David Farrar in ‘The Small Back Room’ (1949). Via Film Forum“The Small Back Room” is a movie that elides glib categorization. In his autobiography, “Million Dollar Movie,” Powell hinted that the reasons for the flat box office receipts might have been its presumed lack of focus: “The public stayed away. They refused to accept that it was a love story. It was a war film. And war films were out — O-U-T.” Not only is the picture a convincing love story and a tense thriller, but it is a comedy of manners. The precisely configured array of supporting characters doesn’t only provide comic relief, but the requisite class consciousness and genuine moments of tenderness.Everyone involved in the movie is at the top of their game. Kathleen Bryon as Rice’s inamorata Susan is a performance for the ages, encapsulating, as she does, a stern admixture of devotion, longing, patience, and forgiveness. Cinematographer Christopher Challis clearly thought the world of Bryon, and bathed her in a caressing, heavenly light. Then again, he was only following the bosses’ orders and, in this paragon of cinematic achievement, Powell and Pressburger were touched with something approaching grace. Powell later said of “The Small Back Room”: “I think this is my best film.” New Yorkers have an opportunity to judge for themselves.

It’s a Big New York Summer for Filmmakers Powell and Pressburger, and Film Forum Has the Gem

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