I Know Where I’m Going!

The films of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger were a big boost back in the early days of DVD Savant. Reader response to the films of The Archers, Sergio Leone, and titles like  Invaders from Mars and  Until the End of the World gave DVD Savant its first burst of popularity. We made a lot of good connections over the first Criterion DVD of P&P’s superlative  I Know Where I’m Going!, a movie that had a secret cult among fans not normally given to movie fandom. We first caught the show around 1991 on a late night PBS airing, in a somewhat mangled print. Criterion’s early laserdisc and subsequent DVD weren’t a terrific improvement, but the quality didn’t stop us from proselytizing for the movie and buying copies for friends. Fans of The Archers are different than those for Spaghetti Westerns or Italian Giallos — the people that corresponded over IKWIG! were the kind that bake pies and write personal letters in longhand.

Criterion has had the inside track for most everything Powell & Pressburger- related, so we’ve enjoyed roughly 25 years of new and improved releases: DVDs, HD Blu-rays, and finally (for now) a few choice 4K disc releases. I Know Where I’m Going! never made the grade for an update even to HD, which had us worrying that decent printing masters for the show might have disappeared into a Scottish maelstrom. But judging by the eye-popping new 4K, they do exist and are in great shape.

Although filmed in B&W, I Know Where I’m Going! seems just as big an accomplishment as The Archers’  The Red Shoes. It is their most endearingly sentimental feature. Practically a Bed and Breakfast movie, it overflows with thoughtful meditations on the worth of personal goals. You too will be seduced by Scottish folk music, strange little songs, and cartoon-like visual accents that suggest literary ‘Magical Realism.’

It’s at the head of the list of films that appeal to one’s general optimism. 

Several Powell and Pressburger films achieve a universal appeal despite focusing on specific English issues. Edging away from the expected jingoistic themes in wartime, the filmmakers instead found positive ways to express the values that made England worth fighting for. P&P’s earlier  A Canterbury Tale confronted three young wartime volunteers with the majesty of their precious national heritage. In IKWIG! the war is apparently nearly won, and stays in the background. The viewer is instead asked to ponder what direction the country should take after the victory. Its ambitious, spirited, and sometimes wrong-headed heroine is convinced that she’s on the right path … at least at first.

Leading lady Wendy Hiller was a top English talent in her prime. She was a favorite of George Bernard Shaw, with accomplished performances in Pygmalion and  Major Barbara. Do many Americans still know of Dame Wendy Hiller?  The point of reference for younger viewers is likely her small part in David Lynch’s  The Elephant Man.

The show opens with a swing-music prologue that doubles as a main credit sequence. Ambitious and headstrong since childhood, young Englishwoman Joan Webster (Wendy Hiller) journeys by train to the Northern Isles of Scotland. Her destination is her own wedding, to a stuffy millionaire industrialist twice her age. Joan claims that romance is but a trifling matter; she sees nothing troubling in the prestige and class that the marriage will make hers. But bad weather delays the last leg of Joan’s long trip by land and sea, and finally maroons her in a tiny coastal village with only one telephone. Worse, she’s exposed to temptation in the form of a Royal Navy officer on leave, Torquil MacNeil (Roger Livesey).  Also stranded by the storm, Torquil is immediately attracted to Joan. She resists mightily, but Torquil, the locals and the vibrant landscape itself tempt her with a vision of an alternate future. She begins to reassess a set of values she had previously discounted. Meanwhile, her wedding dress hangs in its cellophane bag. If she can’t get to that gale-tossed island, all of her proud plans may crumble.

25 years ago most Powell & Pressburger films were fairly obscure, at least in the U.S.. The cult has since expanded enough to include the minority of movie lovers still interested in older movies. I Know Where I’m Going! is so precious that reviewers’ principles encourage us to keep our coverage brief, to hint at its treasures rather than spoil the experience of seeing it fresh. If you’re married or have a girlfriend or boyfriend, this show cannot be recommended more highly.

A woman accustomed to getting her way in all things. 

Michael Powell’s fast-paced journey northward conjures amusingly creative visual magic, like a top hat that chugs smoke like a railroad engine. In a dream sequence, Joan Webster literally marries a factory dynamo, while her train traverses a Scottish landscape covered with tartan patterns. The fantasy makes Joan’s frustration seem all the more intolerable when her progress is suddenly halted. She then finds herself seduced by an amazing, isolated place, as much as by the attentions of the handsome and charming Torquil McNeil. Soaked in fog and sea spray, the locale abounds with petty superstitions, grand myths and proud traditions. Joan cannot help but be deeply affected. Life out there has a flavor unlike anything she’s known back in London.

Miss Webster’s impatience is countered by the unspoken communication between Torquil and the luminous Catriona Potts, played by Pamela Brown.  →  Stomping into her house with a brace of hunting dogs, Catriona comes on like a primal force of nature. Her dark eyes comment silently on everything she witnesses.

When Joan bribes a needy local boy into taking a risky boat trip against the counsel of harbormaster Ruairidh Mor (Finlay Currie), the film’s themes come together in a literal oceanic whirlpool, straight out of Norse legend. Joan’s selfishness affects a young local couple, Kenny and Bridie (Murdo Morrison and Margot Fitzsimmons). Our disapproval of Joan’s willingness to risk lives goes against the norms of escapist movie romances: We’re accustomed to entertainment that gives people in love the right to make their own rules.  Joan’s crisis elevates I Know Where I’m Going! high above what passes for light romance at the movies, in 1945 or in 2025.

Joan’s dilemma also relates to England as a whole. IKWIG! offers a nudge to a nation emerging from the Second World War, to consider a socially kinder, more equitable future. England seems so civilized in movies that Americans forget about its fundamental class distinctions. The rich industrialist that Joan can’t wait to marry has presumably profited mightily from WW2 while sitting out all the unpleasantness on a leased island retreat. Because of the war, even the local Scottish landowners can’t make ends meet. Torquil waits tables; he and Catriona hunt rabbits to put meat on the table. Young couples like Kenny and Bridie have few options. Their marriage plans are postponed indefinitely. To gain a place in the local economy, they may have to wait until someone dies.

Joan Webster is a good person, but her rush to throw herself into a future of elite luxury seems fundamentally wrong. Never ones to make blunt social statements, Powell and Pressburger instead offer a vision of a national strength of character. By comparison, the grousing that ‘kitchen-sink’ films would offer a decade later seem less than useful. The movie asks if England should marry the aloof upper class or embrace her people, and provides a compelling answer.

On the personal level, a good woman with understandable intentions re-orders her wants and priorities in just a couple of days. IKWIG! is Powell and Pressburger at their creative peak. It feels healthy, optimistic like a breath of fresh air.