'I Know Where I'm Going!' (1945)

Directors:

Michael Powell
Emeric Pressburger

Writers:

Michael Powell (written by) &
Emeric Pressburger (written by)

Release Date:

9 August 1947 (USA)

Genre:

Drama | Romance

Plot:

Joan Webster is an ambitious and stubborn middle-class English woman determined to move forward since her childhood...

Plot Keywords:

Island | Scotland | Whirlpool | Boat | Dream Sequence

Cast

Wendy Hiller	...	Joan Webster
Roger Livesey	...	Torquil MacNeil
Pamela Brown	...	Catriona
Finlay Currie	...	Ruairidh Mhór
George Carney	...	Mr. Webster
Nancy Price	...	Mrs. Crozier
Catherine Lacey	...	Mrs. Robinson
Jean Cadell	...	Postmistress
John Laurie	...	John Campbell
Valentine Dyall	...	Mr. Robinson
Norman Shelley	...	Sir Robert Bellinger (on radio telephone) (voice)
Margot Fitzsimons	...	Bridie
Murdo Morrison	...	Kenny
Captain C.W.R. Knight	...	Colonel Barnstaple (as Captain C.W.R. Knight, F.Z.S.)
Walter Hudd	...	Hunter

Runtime:

91 min

Country:

UK

Language:

English | Scottish Gaelic

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Recording)

Certification:

Australia:G | USA:Not Rated | Finland:S | Sweden:Btl | UK:U (video rating) (1991) (uncut) | UK:U (original rating) (cut) | UK:U

Filming Locations:

Argyll and Bute, Scotland, UK

Company:

Archers, The

Trivia:

Roger Livesey was told that he was too old and too portly to play Torquil. Livesey soon managed to lose 20 pounds and altered his appearance to play the young Lieutenant.

Goofs:

Boom mic visible: The reflection of a boom mic is visible in a picture frame in Joan's hotel room.

Quotes:

Torquil MacNeil: She wouldn't see a pound note from one pensions day to another.
Joan Webster: People around here are very poor I suppose.
Torquil MacNeil: Not poor, they just haven't got money.
Joan Webster: It's the same thing.
Torquil MacNeil: Oh no, it's something quite different.

Movie Connections:

Featured in "Arena: A Pretty British Affair" (1981)

Soundtrack:

I Know Where I'm Going

One of a kind

It's really "It Happened One Night" -- spoiled girl, on the way to wed her rich fiance, is escorted by a younger man and falls in love with him -- but it's so much more. Powell's and Pressburger's imaginations are boundless. They create characters who are lovable eccentrics, but believable. They shift tone effortlessly from comedy to thriller to travelogue to romance and back again. They employ every resource of cinema, without being showy about it: watch the camera tricks in the first ten minutes alone. They fill the movie with diversions that have little to do with the plot but create a beautifully picaresque atmosphere.

I don't know of any other movie that is so inconsequential on the face of it, yet packs such an enormous emotional wallop. Ostensibly an assembly-line romantic comedy, it's really about spiritual growth, opening yourself to all sorts of new experiences and learning to see things from others' points of view. It's whimsical, but not thin. With its moody photography, wonderful musical score, and numerous coups de cinema, it lingers in your memory months after you've seen it. And the ending is one of the most satisfying in all the movies.

One minor complaint: Hiller is a tad too steely in the beginning, too crisp, too calculating-actress-playing-calculating-character. As she succumbs to the charms of her surroundings and her leading man, though, she's bewitching. And Livesey has one of the most beautiful speaking voices you'll ever hear. Their chemistry is terrific. And when he recites a Celtic poem ending in, "you're the one for me," and looks right at her, it's quite sexy.

There's no other movie quite like it. And I defy anyone to see it on a date and not fall in love with his/her vis-a-vis.