49th Parallel. 1941. Great Britain. Directed by Michael Powell. Screenplay by Emeric Pressburger, Rodney Ackland. With Laurence Olivier, Leslie Howard, Raymond Massey, Anton Walbrook. 35mm courtesy Park Circus. 123 min.
“This deft propaganda film, in which a stranded U-boat crew endure a perilous Canadian odyssey en route to the neutral USA, was Pressburger’s attempt to outshine Goebbels. While Powell rhapsodises over the Canadian wilderness, Pressburger’s fierce, humane script takes a scalpel to Nazi ideology. By way of thanks, because he was classified an ‘enemy alien’, Emeric was not allowed to go to Canada” (BFI).