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A Matter of Life and Death
A Matter of Life and Death DVD Cover
Directed by	Michael Powell Emeric Pressburger
Produced by	Michael Powell Emeric Pressburger
Written by	Michael Powell Emeric Pressburger
Starring	David Niven Kim Hunter Roger Livesey Raymond Massey
Music by	Allan Gray
Cinematography	Jack Cardiff
Editing by	Reginald Mills
Distributed by	Eagle-Lion (UK) Universal (US)
Release date(s)	November 1, 1946 UK December 25, 1946 USA
Running time	104 min
Country	United Kingdom
Language	English
Budget	£320,000 (estimated)
IMDb profile

A Matter of Life and Death (1946) is a film by the British writer-director-producer team of Powell and Pressburger. The US title was Stairway to Heaven, which was derived from the film's most prominent special effect: a broad escalator linking the other world and Earth. Reversing the convention of The Wizard of Oz, the supernatural scenes are in black-and-white, while the ones on Earth are in Technicolor.

In 2004, it was named the second greatest British film ever made by the magazine Total Film in a poll of 25 film critics.^[1] It was beaten only by Get Carter.

Contents 1 Plot 2 Cast 3 Release 4 Analysis 4.1 Are the visions real? 4.2 Heaven? 4.3 Anglo-American relations 5 Adaptations 5.1 Radio 5.2 TV 5.3 Theatre 6 Sources 7 References 8 External links

Squadron Leader Peter Carter (David Niven) is a British World War II Royal Air Force pilot trying to nurse a badly damaged and burning Lancaster bomber home after a mission in May 1945. His crew has already bailed out, but Carter's parachute has been shot up. He manages to get in touch with June (Kim Hunter), an American radio operator based in England, and carries on a tender conversation with her in the few minutes before he is forced to jump without a usable parachute.

Peter should have died at that time, but doesn't because of a mistake on the part of Conductor 71 (Marius Goring), the guide sent from the "other world" to collect him. They miss each other in the thick fog over the English Channel. Instead, Peter wakes up the next day on a beach near June's base, completely bewildered at still being alive.

Peter meets June who is cycling back from her night shift; the pair fall in love. Conductor 71 (a French aristocrat executed during the French Revolution) appears to Peter, stopping time to explain the situation and to convince him to accept his fate. Peter refuses and demands that the matter be put to a trial. While Conductor 71 goes to consult his superiors, Peter continues to live his life.

On Earth, Peter's visions of Conductor 71 are diagnosed by June's fascinated friend Doctor Reeves (Roger Livesey) as a symptom of a rapidly progressing brain injury - chronic adhesive arachnoiditis from a concussion two years earlier - and he is scheduled for surgery. Reeves' death in a motorcycle accident makes him available to plead Peter's case, arguing that, through no fault of his own, he has fallen in love and now has an earthly commitment which should take precedence over the afterlife's claim on his soul.

The matter comes to a head - mirroring the outcome of the contemporaneous brain surgery - before a celestial court of the whole population of the afterlife - the camera zooms out from an amphitheatre to reveal that it is as large as a spiral galaxy. The prosecutor is American Abraham Farlan (Raymond Massey), who hates the British for causing his death in the American Revolutionary War. Reeves and Farlan call witnesses from history to give evidence. In the end, Reeves has June take the stand (she is made to fall asleep in the "real" world by Conductor 71 so she can testify) and proves that she genuinely loves Peter by telling her that the only way to save his life is to take his place. She steps onto the stairway without hesitation and is carried away, leaving Peter behind. Then the stairway comes to an abrupt halt and June rushes back to Peter's open arms. As Dr. Reeves triumphantly remarks, "...nothing is stronger than the law in the universe, but on Earth, nothing is stronger than love." The jury rules in Peter's favour. The Judge (Abraham Sofaer) shows Reeves the new lifespan granted to the defendant; Reeves calls it "very generous". The scene then shifts to the operating room, where the surgery is declared a success by the surgeon (also played by Sofaer).

• David Niven as Peter Carter
• Kim Hunter as June
• Roger Livesey as Doctor Frank Reeves
• Marius Goring as Conductor 71
• Raymond Massey as Abraham Farlan. Massey and Niven died on the same day, July 29, 1983.
• Abraham Sofaer as the Judge/Surgeon
• Joan Maude as the Chief Recorder
• Robert Coote as Bob Trubshawe

The film was chosen for the first ever Royal Film Performance on November 1, 1946 in aid of the Cinematograph Trade Benevolent Fund. It then went into general release in the UK on December 30, 1946. It premiered in New York City on December 25, 1946 and in Los Angeles on January 23, 1947. (The American release changed the title - see below - and, in the initial release, cut the scenes showing a naked young goatherd, though this is usually included in most versions available today, even those which are still titled Stairway to Heaven.)

While the film never specifically states whether Peter's visions are real, the actor playing the judge also plays the brain surgeon. There are other dual roles but attention is deliberately drawn to the judge/surgeon. As is shown in the paper, "A matter of fried onions" and subsequent work by Diane Broadbent Friedman, there was a large amount of medical research carried out to ensure that the symptoms shown agreed with a correct medical diagnosis of Peter Carter's condition.

There is no explicit reference to "the other world" as Heaven. The word is only used twice, in one conversation, where it may be taken as an adjective. Powell and Pressburger objected to the American distributor's renaming it as Stairway to Heaven, but had to put up with it. The distributor believed that American audiences wouldn't want to see a film with the word "Death" in the title, especially just after World War II.

The architecture of the other world is noticeably modernist; vast and open plan, with huge circular observation holes beneath which the clouds of Earth can be seen. This vision was later the inspiration for the design of a bus station in Walsall, England, by architects Allford Hall Monaghan Morris, and the film's amphitheatre court scene was rendered by BT in an TV advertisement in about 2002 as a metaphor for communication technology, especially the Internet.

The film was originally suggested by a British government department to improve relations between the Americans in the UK and the British public, following Powell and Pressburger's contributions to this sphere in A Canterbury Tale two years earlier, though neither film received any government funding nor input on plot or production. There was a general groundswell of hostility against the American servicemen stationed in the UK for the invasion of Europe. They were viewed as latecomers to the war and as "overpaid, oversexed and over here" by a public that had suffered three years of bombing and rationing, with many of their own men fighting abroad. The premise of the film being a simple inversion, the English pilot gets the pretty American woman, rather than the other way round, and that the only national bigotry is voiced by the first American casualty of the Revolutionary War against the English.

• The film has been twice adapted for the Lux Radio Theater on American radio
  • Stairway to Heaven, 27 October 1947, Episode #587, starring Ray Milland^[2]
  • Stairway to Heaven, 12 April 1955, Episode #918, starring David Niven^[2]
• The film has been adapted for the Screen Director's Playhouse series on American radio
  • Stairway to Heaven, 26 July 1951, starring Robert Cummings^[3]

• The film has been adapted for the Robert Montgomery Presents series on American TV
  • Stairway to Heaven, 9 April 1951 (NBC), starring Richard Greene^[4]
    Note: This was a live performance.

• The film has been adapted as the musical "Stairway to Heaven" at the King's Head in Islington in November 1994.^[5]
• The film has been adapted as a play by the company Kneehigh at the National Theatre, premiering in May 2007.^[6]

• Eric Warman (1946). A Matter of Life and Death. London: World Film Publications. 
• Ian Christie (1994). Arrows of Desire: the films of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. London: Faber & Faber, 163pp (illus. filmog. bibliog. index). ISBN 0-571-16271-1. 
• Ian Christie (2000). A Matter of Life and Death. London: British Film Institute. ISBN 0-85170-479-4. 

1. ^ Get Carter tops British film poll, BBC News, 3rd October 2004
2. ^ ^{a b} Lux Theater details
3. ^ Screen Director's Playhouse details
4. ^ Robert Montgomery Presents details
5. ^ A Matter of Life and Death on stage, 1994
6. ^ A Matter of Life and Death on stage, 2007

• A Matter of Life and Death (film) at the Internet Movie Database
• A Matter of Life and Death (film) at the British Film Institute's Screenonline Full synopsis and film stills (and clips viewable from UK libraries).
• Bus to Paradise, a review of the film inspired Walsall Bus Station.
• Reviews and articles at the Powell & Pressburger Pages
• Trailer at Virgin.net

v • d • e Powell and Pressburger
The films of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger
1930s	The Spy in Black • The Lion Has Wings (not Pressburger)
1940s	Contraband • An Airman's Letter to His Mother • Forty-Ninth Parallel • One of Our Aircraft is Missing • The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp • The Volunteer • A Canterbury Tale • I Know Where I'm Going! • A Matter of Life and Death • Black Narcissus • The Red Shoes • The Small Back Room
1950s	The Elusive Pimpernel • Gone to Earth • The Tales of Hoffmann • Oh... Rosalinda!! • The Battle of the River Plate • Ill Met by Moonlight
1960s	Peeping Tom (not Pressburger) • They're a Weird Mob • Age of Consent (not Pressburger)
1970s	The Boy Who Turned Yellow