The Powell & Pressburger Pages Dedicated to the work of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger and all the other people, both actors and technicians who helped them make those wonderful films. A lot of the documents have been sent to me or have come from other web sites. The name of the web site is given where known. If I have unintentionally included an image or document that is copyrighted or that I shouldn't have done then please email me and I'll remove it. I make no money from this site, it's purely for the love of the films. [Any comments are by me (Steve Crook) and other members of the email list]

Submitted by Mark Fuller

A Canterbury Tale

By Dilys Powell

From: The Sunday Times
May 1944

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In A Canterbury Tale Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger have created what is in effect an elaborate, beautiful, and often witty piece of muddle. The story is half high-minded fantasy, half schoolboy thriller; at one moment the characters are pilgrims in search of blessings or penance in Canterbury, at another a bunch of amateur detectives in search of the Glue Man, a type who enlivens his evenings on fire guard by pouring glue over the hair of the girls of the village. In the end it turns out that he does it out of love for his country, an explanation which would fascinate the psychologists. Eric Portman is massively unembarrassed as the Glue Man, and there is a performance of great charm by John Sweet, a newcomer form scratch who plays in the film what he is in life, an American Army Sergeant. The exterior work of the film is enchanting, and the pictorial handling of the sequences in Canterbury Cathedral seems to me beyond praise.

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