A Canterbury Tale
Encyclopedia
A Canterbury Tale is a 1944 British
film by the film-making team of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger
. It stars Eric Portman
, Sheila Sim
, Dennis Price
and Sgt. John Sweet; Esmond Knight
provided narration and played several small roles. For the postwar American release, Raymond Massey
narrated and Kim Hunter
was added to the film. The film was made in black and white, and was the first of two collaborations between Powell and Pressburger and cinematographer Erwin Hillier
.
A Canterbury Tale takes its title from The Canterbury Tales
of Geoffrey Chaucer
, and loosely uses Chaucer's theme of 'eccentric characters on a religious pilgrimage' to highlight the wartime experiences of the citizens of Kent
, and encourage wartime Anglo-American friendship and understanding.
The story concerns three young people: British Sergeant Peter Gibbs (Dennis Price
), US Army Sergeant Bob Johnson (played by real-life Sergeant John Sweet), and a 'Land Girl
', Miss Alison Smith (Sheila Sim
). The group arrive at the railway station in the fictitious small Kent
town of Chillingbourne (filmed in Chilham
, Fordwich
, Wickhambreaux
and other villages in the area), near Canterbury
, late on Friday night, 27 August 1943. Peter has been stationed at a nearby Army camp, Alison is due to start working on a farm in the area, and Bob left the train by mistake, hearing the announcement "next stop Canterbury" and thinking he was in Canterbury.
As they leave the station together Alison is attacked by a mysterious assailant in uniform who pours glue on her hair, before escaping. It transpires that this has happened quite a few times before. Alison asks Bob if he could spend the weekend in Chillingbourne to help her solve the mystery. The next day, while riding a farm cart in the countryside, Alison meets Peter, who surrounds her cart with his platoon of three Bren Gun Carriers. Alison agrees to meet Peter again. The three decide to investigate the attack, enlisting the help of the locals, including several young boys who play large-scale war game
s.
The three use their detective skills to identify the culprit as a local magistrate, Mr Thomas Colpeper (Eric Portman
), a gentleman farmer and pillar of the community, who also gives local history lectures to soldiers stationed in the district. Alison interviews all the glue man's victims to identify the dates and times of their attacks. Gibbs visits Colpeper at his home and borrows the fire watch roster listing the nights Colpeper was on duty in the town hall, whilst Johnson's boy commandos, under the cover of a paper drive for salvage lets Johnson discover receipts for gum used to make glue sold to Colpeper. The dates of the attacks correspond with Colpeper's night watches where he wore a Home Guard uniform kept in the town hall to carry out his attacks.
On a train journey to Canterbury on the Monday morning, Colpeper joins them in their compartment. They confront him with their suspicions, which he doesn't deny, and they discover that his motive is to prevent the soldiers from being distracted away from his lectures by female company and to help keep the local women faithful to their absent British boyfriends. In Colpeper's words, Chaucer's pilgrims travelled to Canterbury to "receive a blessing, or to do penance". On arriving in the city of Canterbury, devastated by wartime bombing, all three young people receive blessings of their own. Alison discovers that her boyfriend, believed killed in the war, has survived after all; his father, who had blocked their marriage because he thought his son could do better than a shopgirl, finally relents. Bob receives long-delayed letters from his sweetheart, who is now a WAC
in Australia. Peter, a cinema organist before the war, gets to play the music of J.S. Bach
on the large organ at Canterbury Cathedral, before leaving with his unit. He decides not to report Mr Colpeper to the Canterbury police
, as he had planned to do - in its way a blessing for Colpeper, when he had expected instead to do penance.
s. The Cathedral itself was not available for filming as the stained glass
had been taken down, the windows boarded up and the organ, an important location for the story, removed to storage, all for protection against air raids. By the use of clever perspective, large portions of the cathedral were recreated within the studio by art director Alfred Junge
.
style. But this is harnessed to a neo-romantic
sense of the English landscape. This sense that 'the past always haunts the present' in the English landscape was a powerful theme that would be mined by countless British novelists and film-makers from the 1960s onwards.
Described as 'morally weird but forever English', its characters, rare for mainstream cinema, play out their moral choices instead of merely verbalising them.
Anglo-American relations
were also explored in Powell and Pressburger's previous film The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp
and in more detail in their subsequent film A Matter of Life and Death.
, now demolished), Canterbury
, England, an event commemorated there by a plaque unveiled by stars Sheila Sim
and John Sweet in October 2000. The film initially had very poor reviews in the UK press, and only small audiences.
The film was the first production of Powell and Pressburger
not to be a major box office success.Tritton, Paul. A Canterbury Tale - Memories of a Classic Wartime Movie. Canterbury: Tritton Publications, August 2000. ISBN 0-9524094-2-9. With the war over Powell was forced by the studio to completely re-edit the film for the U.S. release, cutting over 20 minutes to make the film shorter and faster moving, adding narration by Raymond Massey
, and filming "bookends" which introduced Kim Hunter
as Sergeant Johnson's girlfriend to make the film more contemporary. At the time of filming, Hunter and Massey were preparing to film A Matter of Life and Death for Powell. Powell filmed her sequences with Sweet on an English set simulating New York City where the couple, now married, presented the film as a flashback
similar to the openings of The Way to the Stars
and 12 O'Clock High. Sweet was actually filmed in New York with the sequences combined. The film was fully restored by the British Film Institute in the late 1970s and the new print was hailed as a masterwork of British cinema. It has since been re-issued on DVD in both the UK and USA.
for the film, musical works featured include:
(John Sweet)
Sergeant Bob Johnson, ASN 31036062, hails from Three Sisters Falls
, Oregon
. On his way from Salisbury
to Canterbury
to meet his friend and fulfil a promise to his mother to see Canterbury Cathedral
, he gets off the train at Chillingbourne (in reality Selling railway station
in Kent
) by mistake and almost immediately gets caught up in the mystery of the "glue man". He has come to Britain as a part of the American Army
preparing for the invasion of Europe
. He becomes more and more willing to learn something about England during his visit.
The original script mentioned that Johnson was on his way to Canterbury as his ancestors had come from there. The producers had originally planned to use Burgess Meredith
in the role but changed their mind in favour of an unknown. Meredith acted as a script editor for Johnson's character.
Sergeant Peter Gibbs is a cinema organist
from London. He has been conscripted into the British Army
and has just been stationed at the military camp outside Chillingbourne, where his unit is engaged in training manoeuvres.
He disembarks from the train at Chillingbourne and, as he and Bob Johnson are escorting Alison Smith from the station to the town hall, he witness the attack by the "glue man". A cynical young Londoner, he initially has no time for any thoughts about Kentish history of the land or its people, but is 'converted' by the end of the film, just as his unit leave the camp and are deployed to an unnamed location.
Alison Smith is a shop assistant in a department store
in London. She has joined the Women's Land Army
to "do her bit" to help in the defence of her country. She has been assigned to the farm of Thomas Colpeper, the local JP in Chillingbourne. Alison had previously spent a happy summer just outside Chillingbourne, living in a caravan
with her fiancé, a geologist who has since joined the RAF
and is missing in action at the outset of the film. (He is reported at the end as alive and in Gibraltar.) Alison is determined to solve the mystery of the "glue man" and seeks the help of Bob Johnson to do so. Johnson replies "You need about as much help as a Flying Fortress"
(Eric Portman)
Thomas Colpeper is a gentleman farmer and magistrate
in Chillingbourne. He is a bachelor, living with his mother and, being very keen on the local history of the area, wants to share that knowledge with everyone around him, particularly with the soldiers from elsewhere in England who have been billeted nearby.
The Narrator reads the modernised extract from Chaucer
's Canterbury Tales
, followed by a piece in Chaucerian style on the changes to Kent since Chaucer's time (both only in the non-US version).
The Seven-Sisters
Soldier is the British sergeant at the lecture who gets into conversation with Bob and then joins Peter and Alison.
The Village-Idiot supplies some information for Peter after the lecture, and is mocked for his speech impediment.
The film uses an adventure and river battle between a group of boys as part of the bucolic setting. The boys were all local to the Canterbury area. Three of them were selected for more important, speaking roles. Leonard Smith played "General" Leslie, James Tamsitt played "General" Terry and David Todd played "Commander" Todd, the boy crying in the boat after the river battle.
The boys also help with the hunt for the "glue Man" by providing some local information, distracting Colpeper so that Peter Gibbs may search a bit more thoroughly and by handing in the receipt book from the grocers which shows that Colpeper had been purchasing gum and other ingredients of glue long-distance from Ryman
's in Canterbury. For their reward in obtaining evidence in the manner of Sherlock Holmes
's Baker Street Irregulars
, Johnson buys the boys a football, seen in the film's final scene in the end credits where they are no longer playing war games.
An important scene takes place in the yard of the local wheelwright and blacksmith. This serves to remind us of the importance of the horse and cart and the knowledge of the old ways of doing things that have served the British countryside for generations. The blacksmith, Ned Horton, was played by George Merritt. The wheelwright, Ned's brother, Jim Horton, was played by Edward Rigby. The real Horton brothers, Ben and Neville, are seen acting as assistants to the actors. Alison doesn't seem to be able to communicate properly with these country folk despite she and they both speaking British English
(indeed, he initially tries to make fun of her for her lack of knowledge of obscure wheelwrighting terms). In contrast, although he's a foreigner, Bob can talk to them because he and Jim Horton both know about woodworking and felling and can speak as equals on that topic.
, the author of Gone With the Wind
, was killed by a speeding automobile whilst walking to a screening of this film in Atlanta, Georgia
, USA in 1949.
There is now an annual festival based around the film, in which film fans tour the film's locations.
Several video art
ists have re-cut the more visionary sections of the film as video-art.
The film was shown in the nave of Canterbury Cathedral
on 19 September 2007 to help raise money for the cathedral restoration fund.
Cinema of the United Kingdom
The United Kingdom has had a major influence on modern cinema. The first moving pictures developed on celluloid film were made in Hyde Park, London in 1889 by William Friese Greene, a British inventor, who patented the process in 1890. It is generally regarded that the British film industry...
film by the film-making team of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger
Powell and Pressburger
The British film-making partnership of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, also known as The Archers, made a series of influential films in the 1940s and 1950s. In 1981 they were recognized for their contributions to British cinema with the BAFTA Academy Fellowship Award, the most prestigious...
. It stars Eric Portman
Eric Portman
Eric Portman was a distinguished English stage and film actor...
, Sheila Sim
Sheila Sim
Sheila Beryl Grant Attenborough, Lady Attenborough , known professionally by her maiden name Sheila Sim, is an English film and theatre actress and the wife of actor and director Richard Attenborough.- Career :...
, Dennis Price
Dennis Price
Dennis Price was an English actor, remembered for his suave screen roles, particularly Louis Mazzini in Kind Hearts and Coronets, and for his portrayal of the omniscient valet Jeeves in 1960s television adaptations of P. G...
and Sgt. John Sweet; Esmond Knight
Esmond Knight
Esmond Penington Knight was an English actor.He was an accomplished actor with a career spanning over half a century. For much of his career Esmond Knight was virtually blind...
provided narration and played several small roles. For the postwar American release, Raymond Massey
Raymond Massey
Raymond Hart Massey was a Canadian/American actor.-Early life:Massey was born in Toronto, Ontario, the son of Anna , who was born in Illinois, and Chester Daniel Massey, the wealthy owner of the Massey-Ferguson Tractor Company. Massey's family could trace their ancestry back to the American...
narrated and Kim Hunter
Kim Hunter
Kim Hunter was an American film, theatre, and television actress. She won both an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award, each as Best Supporting Actress, for her performance as Stella Kowalski in the 1951 film A Streetcar Named Desire...
was added to the film. The film was made in black and white, and was the first of two collaborations between Powell and Pressburger and cinematographer Erwin Hillier
Erwin Hillier
Erwin Hillier was a German-born cinematographer known for his work in British cinema from the 1940s to 1960s.-Early career:...
.
A Canterbury Tale takes its title from The Canterbury Tales
The Canterbury Tales
The Canterbury Tales is a collection of stories written in Middle English by Geoffrey Chaucer at the end of the 14th century. The tales are told as part of a story-telling contest by a group of pilgrims as they travel together on a journey from Southwark to the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket at...
of Geoffrey Chaucer
Geoffrey Chaucer
Geoffrey Chaucer , known as the Father of English literature, is widely considered the greatest English poet of the Middle Ages and was the first poet to have been buried in Poet's Corner of Westminster Abbey...
, and loosely uses Chaucer's theme of 'eccentric characters on a religious pilgrimage' to highlight the wartime experiences of the citizens of Kent
Kent
Kent is a county in southeast England, and is one of the home counties. It borders East Sussex, Surrey and Greater London and has a defined boundary with Essex in the middle of the Thames Estuary. The ceremonial county boundaries of Kent include the shire county of Kent and the unitary borough of...
, and encourage wartime Anglo-American friendship and understanding.
Plot
Dennis Price
Dennis Price was an English actor, remembered for his suave screen roles, particularly Louis Mazzini in Kind Hearts and Coronets, and for his portrayal of the omniscient valet Jeeves in 1960s television adaptations of P. G...
), US Army Sergeant Bob Johnson (played by real-life Sergeant John Sweet), and a 'Land Girl
Women's Land Army
The Women's Land Army was a British civilian organisation created during the First and Second World Wars to work in agriculture replacing men called up to the military. Women who worked for the WLA were commonly known as Land Girls...
', Miss Alison Smith (Sheila Sim
Sheila Sim
Sheila Beryl Grant Attenborough, Lady Attenborough , known professionally by her maiden name Sheila Sim, is an English film and theatre actress and the wife of actor and director Richard Attenborough.- Career :...
). The group arrive at the railway station in the fictitious small Kent
Kent
Kent is a county in southeast England, and is one of the home counties. It borders East Sussex, Surrey and Greater London and has a defined boundary with Essex in the middle of the Thames Estuary. The ceremonial county boundaries of Kent include the shire county of Kent and the unitary borough of...
town of Chillingbourne (filmed in Chilham
Chilham
Chilham is a parish in the English county of Kent. Visited by tourists worldwide, it is known for its beauty. Chilham has been a location for a number of films and television dramas...
, Fordwich
Fordwich
Fordwich is the smallest place in Britain with a town council, having a population of 351 recorded in the 2001 census. It lies in Kent, on the River Stour, northeast of Canterbury....
, Wickhambreaux
Wickhambreaux
Wickhambreaux is a village, just off the A257 Sandwich Road, five miles from Canterbury in the county of Kent, England, United Kingdom.-History:Wickhambreaux manor was the home of Joan of Kent, wife to Edward Plantagenet, and mother of Richard II...
and other villages in the area), near Canterbury
Canterbury
Canterbury is a historic English cathedral city, which lies at the heart of the City of Canterbury, a district of Kent in South East England. It lies on the River Stour....
, late on Friday night, 27 August 1943. Peter has been stationed at a nearby Army camp, Alison is due to start working on a farm in the area, and Bob left the train by mistake, hearing the announcement "next stop Canterbury" and thinking he was in Canterbury.
As they leave the station together Alison is attacked by a mysterious assailant in uniform who pours glue on her hair, before escaping. It transpires that this has happened quite a few times before. Alison asks Bob if he could spend the weekend in Chillingbourne to help her solve the mystery. The next day, while riding a farm cart in the countryside, Alison meets Peter, who surrounds her cart with his platoon of three Bren Gun Carriers. Alison agrees to meet Peter again. The three decide to investigate the attack, enlisting the help of the locals, including several young boys who play large-scale war game
Military simulation
Military simulations, also known informally as war games, are simulations in which theories of warfare can be tested and refined without the need for actual hostilities. Many professional contemporary analysts object to the term wargames as this is generally taken to be referring to the civilian...
s.
The three use their detective skills to identify the culprit as a local magistrate, Mr Thomas Colpeper (Eric Portman
Eric Portman
Eric Portman was a distinguished English stage and film actor...
), a gentleman farmer and pillar of the community, who also gives local history lectures to soldiers stationed in the district. Alison interviews all the glue man's victims to identify the dates and times of their attacks. Gibbs visits Colpeper at his home and borrows the fire watch roster listing the nights Colpeper was on duty in the town hall, whilst Johnson's boy commandos, under the cover of a paper drive for salvage lets Johnson discover receipts for gum used to make glue sold to Colpeper. The dates of the attacks correspond with Colpeper's night watches where he wore a Home Guard uniform kept in the town hall to carry out his attacks.
On a train journey to Canterbury on the Monday morning, Colpeper joins them in their compartment. They confront him with their suspicions, which he doesn't deny, and they discover that his motive is to prevent the soldiers from being distracted away from his lectures by female company and to help keep the local women faithful to their absent British boyfriends. In Colpeper's words, Chaucer's pilgrims travelled to Canterbury to "receive a blessing, or to do penance". On arriving in the city of Canterbury, devastated by wartime bombing, all three young people receive blessings of their own. Alison discovers that her boyfriend, believed killed in the war, has survived after all; his father, who had blocked their marriage because he thought his son could do better than a shopgirl, finally relents. Bob receives long-delayed letters from his sweetheart, who is now a WAC
Women's Army Corps
The Women's Army Corps was the women's branch of the US Army. It was created as an auxiliary unit, the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps on 15 May 1942 by Public Law 554, and converted to full status as the WAC in 1943...
in Australia. Peter, a cinema organist before the war, gets to play the music of J.S. Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...
on the large organ at Canterbury Cathedral, before leaving with his unit. He decides not to report Mr Colpeper to the Canterbury police
Kent Police
Kent Police is the territorial police force for Kent in England, including the unitary authority of Medway.-Area and organisation:The force covers an area of with an approximate population of 1,660,588 . The Chief Constable is currently Ian Learmonth, who was appointed in 2010 and is the former...
, as he had planned to do - in its way a blessing for Colpeper, when he had expected instead to do penance.
Cast
- Sgt. John Sweet, US Army as Bob Johnson
- Dennis PriceDennis PriceDennis Price was an English actor, remembered for his suave screen roles, particularly Louis Mazzini in Kind Hearts and Coronets, and for his portrayal of the omniscient valet Jeeves in 1960s television adaptations of P. G...
as Peter Gibbs - Sheila SimSheila SimSheila Beryl Grant Attenborough, Lady Attenborough , known professionally by her maiden name Sheila Sim, is an English film and theatre actress and the wife of actor and director Richard Attenborough.- Career :...
as Alison Smith - Eric PortmanEric PortmanEric Portman was a distinguished English stage and film actor...
as Thomas Colpeper - Esmond KnightEsmond KnightEsmond Penington Knight was an English actor.He was an accomplished actor with a career spanning over half a century. For much of his career Esmond Knight was virtually blind...
as Narrator / Seven-Sisters Soldier / Village Idiot - Kim HunterKim HunterKim Hunter was an American film, theatre, and television actress. She won both an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award, each as Best Supporting Actress, for her performance as Stella Kowalski in the 1951 film A Streetcar Named Desire...
as Johnson's Girl (US release) - Raymond MasseyRaymond MasseyRaymond Hart Massey was a Canadian/American actor.-Early life:Massey was born in Toronto, Ontario, the son of Anna , who was born in Illinois, and Chester Daniel Massey, the wealthy owner of the Massey-Ferguson Tractor Company. Massey's family could trace their ancestry back to the American...
as Narrator (US version) (voice)
Production
The film is notable for its many exterior shots showing the Kent countryside, as well as extensive bombsites in Canterbury itself, so soon after the infamous Baedeker raids of May/June 1942 which had destroyed large areas of the city centre. Many local people, including a lot of young boys, were recruited as extras for the extensive scenes of children's outdoor activities such as river 'battles' and denChildren's den
A children's den is a shelter or hideout built by children, often involving broken fence-boards, nets and sticks. It is often built in a bush or tree. A classic den uses a panel of wood for the roof, floorboards or fence-boards for the floor and a net with leaves on it as camouflage...
s. The Cathedral itself was not available for filming as the stained glass
Stained glass
The term stained glass can refer to coloured glass as a material or to works produced from it. Throughout its thousand-year history, the term has been applied almost exclusively to the windows of churches and other significant buildings...
had been taken down, the windows boarded up and the organ, an important location for the story, removed to storage, all for protection against air raids. By the use of clever perspective, large portions of the cathedral were recreated within the studio by art director Alfred Junge
Alfred Junge
Alfred Junge was a German-born production designer.Junge had wanted to be an artist from childhood. Dabbling in theatre in his teenage years, he joined the Görlitz Stadttheater at eighteen and was involved in all areas of production. He worked in the theatre for over fifteen years...
.
Style and themes
The film's visual style is a mixture of British realism and Hillier's German ExpressionistGerman Expressionism
German Expressionism refers to a number of related creative movements beginning in Germany before the First World War that reached a peak in Berlin, during the 1920s...
style. But this is harnessed to a neo-romantic
Neo-romanticism
The term neo-romanticism is used to cover a variety of movements in music, painting and architecture. It has been used with reference to very late 19th century and early 20th century composers such as Gustav Mahler particularly by Carl Dahlhaus who uses it as synonymous with late Romanticism...
sense of the English landscape. This sense that 'the past always haunts the present' in the English landscape was a powerful theme that would be mined by countless British novelists and film-makers from the 1960s onwards.
Described as 'morally weird but forever English', its characters, rare for mainstream cinema, play out their moral choices instead of merely verbalising them.
Anglo-American (mis)understandings
A major theme is Johnson's problems with, and gradual acceptance of, the differences and common ground of American and British 1940s life and heritage, along with the townsfolk's acceptance of him. These include:- His surprise at the station that so small a settlement as Chillingbourne is a town
- His lack of acquaintance with the British blackoutBlackout (wartime)A blackout during war, or apprehended war, is the practice of collectively minimizing outdoor light, including upwardly directed light. This was done in the 20th century to prevent crews of enemy aircraft from being able to navigate to their targets simply by sight, for example during the London...
, particularly in his use of a torch that is far too bright for it, at the station and in chasing the "glue man" (after Johnson brags about his "flashlight", Gibbs later satirically calls it a "searchlightSearchlightA searchlight is an apparatus that combines a bright light source with some form of curved reflector or other optics to project a powerful beam of light of approximately parallel rays in a particular direction, usually constructed so that it can be swiveled about.-Military use:The Royal Navy used...
") - American sergeantSergeantSergeant is a rank used in some form by most militaries, police forces, and other uniformed organizations around the world. Its origins are the Latin serviens, "one who serves", through the French term Sergent....
's stripes (chevrons) being upside-down compared with British ones (a repeated joke) - British police not carrying guns, and generally not acting as quickly as their American counterparts (when they chase the glueman to the town hall at the start — to which the constable replies that they may not be as fast or active as "G MenFederal Bureau of InvestigationThe Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
" or London policemenMetropolitan Police ServiceThe Metropolitan Police Service is the territorial police force responsible for Greater London, excluding the "square mile" of the City of London which is the responsibility of the City of London Police...
but they know their ways and do their duty, and that with regard to guns "This is Chillingbourne ... not Chicago.") - The identical ways of woodworking between Oregon and Kent in his chat with Mr Horton that gives a mutual understanding and respect between Johnson and Mr Horton.
- A quarterQuarter (United States coin)A quarter dollar, commonly shortened to quarter, is a coin worth ¼ of a United States dollar, or 25 cents. The quarter has been produced since 1796. The choice of 25¢ as a denomination, as opposed to 20¢ which is more common in other parts of the world, originated with the practice of dividing...
(quarter dollar) being equivalent to a shillingShillingThe shilling is a unit of currency used in some current and former British Commonwealth countries. The word shilling comes from scilling, an accounting term that dates back to Anglo-Saxon times where it was deemed to be the value of a cow in Kent or a sheep elsewhere. The word is thought to derive...
, to the boy standing on the hay cart near the beginning and to the boys in the mill - Drug stores being called grocerGrocerA grocer is a bulk seller of food. Beginning as early as the 14th century, a grocer was a dealer in comestible dry goods such as spices, pepper, sugar, and cocoa, tea and coffee...
s, just after the river battle - Telephones, mirrors, tea drinking, left-hand driving, as he lists when struggling with a British telephone
- Comparing British and American rivers and countryside, when he and Gibbs look down on the River StourRiver Stour, KentThe River Stour is the river in Kent, England that flows into the English Channel at Pegwell Bay. Above Plucks Gutter, where the Little Stour joins it, the river is normally known as the Great Stour. The upper section of the river, above its confluence with the East Stour at Ashford is sometimes...
after climbing a hill towards the end of the film - When offered tea, he asks Gibbs how he can "drink the stuff". Gibbs replies that Johnson has joined the tea drinkers of the world, for the only countries that haven't been defeated and conquered yet by the Nazis and Japanese are the tea-drinking ones, England, Russia, and China.
- At the film's end, Johnson reluctantly accepts an offer of tea from his American friend Mickey who says "it's a habit you just fall into — like marijuana" (to which Johnson replies, “I’ll take marijuana.” (Or possibly, “I don’t take marijuana,” with ‘don’t’ slurred into ‘take’. Midwestern accent. The actor was from Minnesota.) “You’ll drink tea and like it.” “I’ll drink it, but I won’t like it.” (1 hour 57 minutes)
- In wonder at the cathedral interior at the end of the film, he comments to himself that his "father's pa" (grandfather) "built the First BaptistBaptistBaptists comprise a group of Christian denominations and churches that subscribe to a doctrine that baptism should be performed only for professing believers , and that it must be done by immersion...
Church in Johnson County...Oregon red cedarThuja plicataThuja plicata, commonly called Western or pacific red cedar, giant or western arborvitae, giant cedar, or shinglewood, is a species of Thuja, an evergreen coniferous tree in the cypress family Cupressaceae native to western North America...
, cedar shingles, 1887...well, that was a good job too".
Anglo-American relations
Anglo-American relations
British–American relations encompass many complex relations over the span of four centuries, beginning in 1607 with England's first permanent colony in North America called Jamestown, to the present day, between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the United States of...
were also explored in Powell and Pressburger's previous film The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp
The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp
The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp is a 1943 film by the British film making team of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger under the production banner of The Archers. It stars Roger Livesey, Deborah Kerr and Anton Walbrook. The title derives from the satirical Colonel Blimp comic strip by David...
and in more detail in their subsequent film A Matter of Life and Death.
Reception
The world premiere was held on 11 May 1944 at the Friars' Cinema (later the second site of the Marlowe TheatreMarlowe Theatre
The Marlowe Theatre is a major 1200-seat theatre in Canterbury, England.It closed in March 2009 for redevelopment and a brand-new Marlowe Theatre re-opened to audiences on 4 October 2011.-Name:...
, now demolished), Canterbury
Canterbury
Canterbury is a historic English cathedral city, which lies at the heart of the City of Canterbury, a district of Kent in South East England. It lies on the River Stour....
, England, an event commemorated there by a plaque unveiled by stars Sheila Sim
Sheila Sim
Sheila Beryl Grant Attenborough, Lady Attenborough , known professionally by her maiden name Sheila Sim, is an English film and theatre actress and the wife of actor and director Richard Attenborough.- Career :...
and John Sweet in October 2000. The film initially had very poor reviews in the UK press, and only small audiences.
The film was the first production of Powell and Pressburger
Powell and Pressburger
The British film-making partnership of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, also known as The Archers, made a series of influential films in the 1940s and 1950s. In 1981 they were recognized for their contributions to British cinema with the BAFTA Academy Fellowship Award, the most prestigious...
not to be a major box office success.Tritton, Paul. A Canterbury Tale - Memories of a Classic Wartime Movie. Canterbury: Tritton Publications, August 2000. ISBN 0-9524094-2-9. With the war over Powell was forced by the studio to completely re-edit the film for the U.S. release, cutting over 20 minutes to make the film shorter and faster moving, adding narration by Raymond Massey
Raymond Massey
Raymond Hart Massey was a Canadian/American actor.-Early life:Massey was born in Toronto, Ontario, the son of Anna , who was born in Illinois, and Chester Daniel Massey, the wealthy owner of the Massey-Ferguson Tractor Company. Massey's family could trace their ancestry back to the American...
, and filming "bookends" which introduced Kim Hunter
Kim Hunter
Kim Hunter was an American film, theatre, and television actress. She won both an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award, each as Best Supporting Actress, for her performance as Stella Kowalski in the 1951 film A Streetcar Named Desire...
as Sergeant Johnson's girlfriend to make the film more contemporary. At the time of filming, Hunter and Massey were preparing to film A Matter of Life and Death for Powell. Powell filmed her sequences with Sweet on an English set simulating New York City where the couple, now married, presented the film as a flashback
Flashback (narrative)
Flashback is an interjected scene that takes the narrative back in time from the current point the story has reached. Flashbacks are often used to recount events that happened before the story’s primary sequence of events or to fill in crucial backstory...
similar to the openings of The Way to the Stars
The Way to the Stars
The Way to the Stars, also known as Johnny in the Clouds, is a 1945 British war drama film made by Two Cities Films and released by United Artists. It was produced by Anatole de Grunwald and directed by Anthony Asquith...
and 12 O'Clock High. Sweet was actually filmed in New York with the sequences combined. The film was fully restored by the British Film Institute in the late 1970s and the new print was hailed as a masterwork of British cinema. It has since been re-issued on DVD in both the UK and USA.
Music featured
Besides that composed by Allan GrayAllan Gray (composer)
Allan Gray was a composer, noted for his film scores.He was born Józef Żmigrod in Tarnów, which was then in Austria-Hungary, but is now part of Poland. He studied under the renowned Austrian composer Arnold Schönberg during the 1920s, and later wrote music for Max Reinhardt's theatre productions...
for the film, musical works featured include:
- Angelus ad VirginemAngelus ad virginemAngelus ad Virginem was a popular medieval carol, whose text is a poetic version of the Hail Mary and the Annunciation to the Virgin Mary. Probably Franciscan in origin, it was brought to Britain by French friars in the 13th century...
mid-15th century polyphony heard as a peal of bells in orchestral guise under the opening titles - Commando Patrol by Allan Gray, Stan Bowsher, Walter Ridley - quickstep heard in the background during Johnson and Gibbs's scene in the lobby of the Hand of Glory
- I See You Everywhere by Allan Gray, Stan Bowsher, Walter Ridley - slow foxtrot heard in the background during Johnson and Gibbs's scene in the lobby of the Hand of Glory
- Turkey in the Straw - folksong heard as Agnes leaves Bob's bedroom
- Come to the Church in the Wild Wood - Bob sings as he washes
- Hear my prayer, O Lord by Henry PurcellHenry PurcellHenry Purcell – 21 November 1695), was an English organist and Baroque composer of secular and sacred music. Although Purcell incorporated Italian and French stylistic elements into his compositions, his legacy was a uniquely English form of Baroque music...
- the ethereal choral music heard as Gibbs pauses on entering the cathedral - Bond of Friendship - Regimental March of the King's Division. Played as the band nears the Cathedral
- Toccata and Fugue in D minor, BWV 538Toccata and Fugue in D minor, BWV 538The Toccata and Fugue in D minor, BWV 538, is an organ piece by Johann Sebastian Bach. Like the better-known BWV 565, BWV 538 also bears the title Toccata and Fugue in D minor, although it is often referred to by the nickname Dorian - a reference to the fact that the piece is written with a key...
by JS Bach (the original while inside the cathedral and the orchestration by Leopold StokowskiLeopold StokowskiLeopold Anthony Stokowski was a British-born, naturalised American orchestral conductor, well known for his free-hand performing style that spurned the traditional baton and for obtaining a characteristically sumptuous sound from many of the great orchestras he conducted.In America, Stokowski...
outside the cathedral) and the hymn Onward Christian Soldiers - played on the organ by Gibbs
Acknowledgements
Before the credits, the following plays over an image of the cathedral from the Christ Church Gate:Sgt. Bob Johnson
Sergeant Bob Johnson, ASN 31036062, hails from Three Sisters Falls
Three Sisters (Oregon)
The Three Sisters are three volcanic peaks of the Cascade Volcanic Arc and the Cascade Range in Oregon, each of which exceeds in elevation. They are the third, fourth, and fifth highest peaks in the state of Oregon and are located in the Three Sisters Wilderness, about southwest from the nearest...
, Oregon
Oregon
Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...
. On his way from Salisbury
Salisbury
Salisbury is a cathedral city in Wiltshire, England and the only city in the county. It is the second largest settlement in the county...
to Canterbury
Canterbury
Canterbury is a historic English cathedral city, which lies at the heart of the City of Canterbury, a district of Kent in South East England. It lies on the River Stour....
to meet his friend and fulfil a promise to his mother to see Canterbury Cathedral
Canterbury Cathedral
Canterbury Cathedral in Canterbury, Kent, is one of the oldest and most famous Christian structures in England and forms part of a World Heritage Site....
, he gets off the train at Chillingbourne (in reality Selling railway station
Selling railway station
Selling railway station serves the village of Selling in Kent, England. The station is 89 km south east of London Victoria on the Chatham Main Line towards Dover Priory. The station is served and operated by Southeastern....
in Kent
Kent
Kent is a county in southeast England, and is one of the home counties. It borders East Sussex, Surrey and Greater London and has a defined boundary with Essex in the middle of the Thames Estuary. The ceremonial county boundaries of Kent include the shire county of Kent and the unitary borough of...
) by mistake and almost immediately gets caught up in the mystery of the "glue man". He has come to Britain as a part of the American Army
United States Army
The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...
preparing for the invasion of Europe
D-Day
D-Day is a term often used in military parlance to denote the day on which a combat attack or operation is to be initiated. "D-Day" often represents a variable, designating the day upon which some significant event will occur or has occurred; see Military designation of days and hours for similar...
. He becomes more and more willing to learn something about England during his visit.
The original script mentioned that Johnson was on his way to Canterbury as his ancestors had come from there. The producers had originally planned to use Burgess Meredith
Burgess Meredith
Oliver Burgess Meredith , known professionally as Burgess Meredith, was an American actor in theatre, film, and television, who also worked as a director...
in the role but changed their mind in favour of an unknown. Meredith acted as a script editor for Johnson's character.
Sgt. Peter Gibbs
(Dennis Price)Sergeant Peter Gibbs is a cinema organist
Theatre organ
A theatre organ is a pipe organ originally designed specifically for imitation of an orchestra. New designs have tended to be around some of the sounds and blends unique to the instrument itself....
from London. He has been conscripted into the British Army
British Army
The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...
and has just been stationed at the military camp outside Chillingbourne, where his unit is engaged in training manoeuvres.
He disembarks from the train at Chillingbourne and, as he and Bob Johnson are escorting Alison Smith from the station to the town hall, he witness the attack by the "glue man". A cynical young Londoner, he initially has no time for any thoughts about Kentish history of the land or its people, but is 'converted' by the end of the film, just as his unit leave the camp and are deployed to an unnamed location.
Alison Smith
(Sheila Sim)Alison Smith is a shop assistant in a department store
Department store
A department store is a retail establishment which satisfies a wide range of the consumer's personal and residential durable goods product needs; and at the same time offering the consumer a choice of multiple merchandise lines, at variable price points, in all product categories...
in London. She has joined the Women's Land Army
Women's Land Army
The Women's Land Army was a British civilian organisation created during the First and Second World Wars to work in agriculture replacing men called up to the military. Women who worked for the WLA were commonly known as Land Girls...
to "do her bit" to help in the defence of her country. She has been assigned to the farm of Thomas Colpeper, the local JP in Chillingbourne. Alison had previously spent a happy summer just outside Chillingbourne, living in a caravan
Travel trailer
A travel trailer or caravan is towed behind a road vehicle to provide a place to sleep which is more comfortable and protected than a tent . It provides the means for people to have their own home on a journey or a vacation, without relying on a motel or hotel, and enables them to stay in places...
with her fiancé, a geologist who has since joined the RAF
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Formed on 1 April 1918, it is the oldest independent air force in the world...
and is missing in action at the outset of the film. (He is reported at the end as alive and in Gibraltar.) Alison is determined to solve the mystery of the "glue man" and seeks the help of Bob Johnson to do so. Johnson replies "You need about as much help as a Flying Fortress"
Thomas Colpeper, JP
Thomas Colpeper is a gentleman farmer and magistrate
Justice of the Peace
A justice of the peace is a puisne judicial officer elected or appointed by means of a commission to keep the peace. Depending on the jurisdiction, they might dispense summary justice or merely deal with local administrative applications in common law jurisdictions...
in Chillingbourne. He is a bachelor, living with his mother and, being very keen on the local history of the area, wants to share that knowledge with everyone around him, particularly with the soldiers from elsewhere in England who have been billeted nearby.
Narrator / Seven-Sisters Soldier / Village Idiot
(Esmond Knight)The Narrator reads the modernised extract from Chaucer
Geoffrey Chaucer
Geoffrey Chaucer , known as the Father of English literature, is widely considered the greatest English poet of the Middle Ages and was the first poet to have been buried in Poet's Corner of Westminster Abbey...
's Canterbury Tales
The Canterbury Tales
The Canterbury Tales is a collection of stories written in Middle English by Geoffrey Chaucer at the end of the 14th century. The tales are told as part of a story-telling contest by a group of pilgrims as they travel together on a journey from Southwark to the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket at...
, followed by a piece in Chaucerian style on the changes to Kent since Chaucer's time (both only in the non-US version).
The Seven-Sisters
Seven Sisters Road
Seven Sisters Road is a road in north London, England which runs within the boroughs of Islington, Hackney and Haringey. It is an extension of Camden Road, running from Holloway Road at the Nags Head crossroads then on to another crossroads with Blackstock Road and Stroud Green Road...
Soldier is the British sergeant at the lecture who gets into conversation with Bob and then joins Peter and Alison.
The Village-Idiot supplies some information for Peter after the lecture, and is mocked for his speech impediment.
The Boys
(Leonard Smith), (James Tamsitt) and (David Todd)The film uses an adventure and river battle between a group of boys as part of the bucolic setting. The boys were all local to the Canterbury area. Three of them were selected for more important, speaking roles. Leonard Smith played "General" Leslie, James Tamsitt played "General" Terry and David Todd played "Commander" Todd, the boy crying in the boat after the river battle.
The boys also help with the hunt for the "glue Man" by providing some local information, distracting Colpeper so that Peter Gibbs may search a bit more thoroughly and by handing in the receipt book from the grocers which shows that Colpeper had been purchasing gum and other ingredients of glue long-distance from Ryman
Ryman
Ryman is the largest British stationery retailer, historically based in London, now based in its £100m headquarters in Crewe, Cheshire.-Formation:...
's in Canterbury. For their reward in obtaining evidence in the manner of Sherlock Holmes
Sherlock Holmes
Sherlock Holmes is a fictional detective created by Scottish author and physician Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The fantastic London-based "consulting detective", Holmes is famous for his astute logical reasoning, his ability to take almost any disguise, and his use of forensic science skills to solve...
's Baker Street Irregulars
Baker Street Irregulars
The Baker Street Irregulars are any of several different groups, all named after the original, from various Sherlock Holmes stories in which they are a gang of young street children whom Holmes often employs to aid his cases.- Original :...
, Johnson buys the boys a football, seen in the film's final scene in the end credits where they are no longer playing war games.
The Hortons
(George Merritt) and (Edward Rigby)An important scene takes place in the yard of the local wheelwright and blacksmith. This serves to remind us of the importance of the horse and cart and the knowledge of the old ways of doing things that have served the British countryside for generations. The blacksmith, Ned Horton, was played by George Merritt. The wheelwright, Ned's brother, Jim Horton, was played by Edward Rigby. The real Horton brothers, Ben and Neville, are seen acting as assistants to the actors. Alison doesn't seem to be able to communicate properly with these country folk despite she and they both speaking British English
British English
British English, or English , is the broad term used to distinguish the forms of the English language used in the United Kingdom from forms used elsewhere...
(indeed, he initially tries to make fun of her for her lack of knowledge of obscure wheelwrighting terms). In contrast, although he's a foreigner, Bob can talk to them because he and Jim Horton both know about woodworking and felling and can speak as equals on that topic.
Legacy
Margaret MitchellMargaret Mitchell
Margaret Munnerlyn Mitchell was an American author and journalist. Mitchell won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1937 for her epic American Civil War era novel, Gone with the Wind, which was the only novel by Mitchell published during her lifetime.-Family:Margaret Mitchell was born in Atlanta,...
, the author of Gone With the Wind
Gone with the Wind
The slaves depicted in Gone with the Wind are primarily loyal house servants, such as Mammy, Pork and Uncle Peter, and these slaves stay on with their masters even after the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 sets them free...
, was killed by a speeding automobile whilst walking to a screening of this film in Atlanta, Georgia
Atlanta, Georgia
Atlanta is the capital and most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia. According to the 2010 census, Atlanta's population is 420,003. Atlanta is the cultural and economic center of the Atlanta metropolitan area, which is home to 5,268,860 people and is the ninth largest metropolitan area in...
, USA in 1949.
There is now an annual festival based around the film, in which film fans tour the film's locations.
Several video art
Video art
Video art is a type of art which relies on moving pictures and comprises video and/or audio data. . Video art came into existence during the 1960s and 1970s, is still widely practiced and has given rise to the widespread use of video installations...
ists have re-cut the more visionary sections of the film as video-art.
The film was shown in the nave of Canterbury Cathedral
Canterbury Cathedral
Canterbury Cathedral in Canterbury, Kent, is one of the oldest and most famous Christian structures in England and forms part of a World Heritage Site....
on 19 September 2007 to help raise money for the cathedral restoration fund.
Parody
The theme of the film was used by Spike Milligan for the Goon Show The Phantom Head Shaver of Brighton in 1954.External links
- Reviews and articles at the Powell & Pressburger Pages
- Criterion Collection essay by Graham Fuller
- Criterion Collection essay by Peter von Bagh
- Powell and Pressburger's 'A Canterbury Tale', an essay by Lawrence Freiesleben
- Scorsese and Schoonmaker talk about A Canterbury Tale
- A screening of A Canterbury Tale in Canterbury cathedral