Cinema Under Pressure is a Monday night film series at The Wende Museum. It explores the struggles over what audiences are permitted to see. Each screening is paired with a discussion featuring a guest expert.

This month’s film is The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943), written, produced, and directed by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. The story follows British officer Clive Candy across forty years of war, peace, and love. His closest friend is a German officer.

Winston Churchill learned of the production in 1942 and asked his ministers to find a way to stop it. The War Office refused to lend the filmmakers military support. Once the film was finished, Churchill tried to block its export. Government reviewers found no reason to suppress it, and the film opened in London in June 1943. American distributors cut it anyway. Later prints ran barely half the original length and dropped the flashback structure that gives the story its shape. The full version was restored in 1983 and is now regarded as one of the finest British films ever made.

Filmmaker Kevin Macdonald joins us for a discussion after the screening. Macdonald is Pressburger’s grandson and wrote his biography. He won an Academy Award for the documentary One Day in September, and his films include Touching the Void, The Last King of Scotland, and Whitney. He will be joined in conversation by Aidan Victor, The Wende Museum’s film curator.

This program is free. RSVPing to this free program does not guarantee admission. Seating is first come, first served.