A Matter of Life and Death Page #2

Synopsis: Returning to England from a bombing run in May 1945, flyer Peter Carter's plane is damaged and his parachute ripped to shreds. He has his crew bail out safely, but figures it is curtains for himself. He gets on the radio, and talks to June, a young American woman working for the USAAF, and they are quite moved by each other's voices. Then he jumps, preferring this to burning up with his plane. He wakes up in the surf. It was his time to die, but there was a mixup in heaven. They couldn't find him in all that fog. By the time his "Conductor" catches up with him 20 hours later, Peter and June have met and fallen in love. This changes everything, and since it happened through no fault of his own, Peter figures that heaven owes him a second chance. Heaven agrees to a trial to decide his fate.
Genre: Comedy, Drama, Fantasy
Production: Universal Pictures
  1 win & 2 nominations.
 
IMDB:
8.1
Rotten Tomatoes:
96%
PG
Year:
1946
104 min
3,219 Views


Hope they haven't gone modern.|I'd hate to have a prop instead!

- "What's the next world like?"|- Oh, Peter!

"I think it starts|where this one leaves off. "

Or where it could if we listened|to Plato, Aristotle and Jesus.

With all our earthly problems solved|but with greater ones worth solving.

I'm signing off now, June.|Goodbye. Goodbye, June.

Hello, G for George. Hello, G, George!

Hello, G, George!

- Hel...|- (clock ticks in the background)

(sobs)

So long, Bob, I'll see you in a minute.

You know what we wear by now -|prop or wings.

(Ghostly voice) A prop... or wings.

Prop...

.. or wings.

Prop...

.. or wings.

A prop... or wings.

Prop... or wings.

Prop...

.. or wings.

(French)

(excitable French)

Vrrrrrrm!

(continues in French)

- Aghh!|- Oh, bad luck, old boy.

(# mouth organ.:
mournful tune)

(# mournful tune plays on)

Name and rank.

(American accent) Come on, fellas,|break it up, spread out.

Room with bath.

- Do you have USO shows here?|- No, we don't.

OK, we'll stay.|Officers' quarters, of course.

- We're all the same here, Captain.|- Excuse me,... brother.

Take over.

- I wish I could make a phone call.|- From here that'd be long distance.

Flying Officer Trubshaw.

You can't wait here. You must be|mistaken about your captain.

- If anyone's mistaken, it's not me.|- Mistakes don't happen here.

- This is the Aircrew Section?|- You should know.

Peter couldn't have got away with it.

Besides, you checked his invoice for me.

Yes, it was against the regulations.

Regulations are made to be broken.|He was due half an hour after me.

This is his section. He hasn't reported.

He's either AWOL|or there's been a mistake.

There hasn't been a mistake here|for 1,000 years.

Oh? So there have been mistakes?

The girl here before me|was here 640 years.

Holy smoke!

If the records don't balance,|alarm bells ring in the Records Office.

I bet they do. Proper flap, eh?

Yes.

That's only the living records.

Everyone on Earth has a file.

Russian, Chinese, black or white,|Republican or Democrat.

Holy smoke! If anyone had said clerks|worked up here just like on Earth...

Everyone here can start how they like.

Heaven, isn't it?

You see?

There are millions of people on Earth|who'd think it heaven to be a clerk.

And don't say "Holy smoke".

- Why not?|- There's no smoke without fire...

.. and we don't call smoke... holy.

Thanks for the gen,... Section Officer.

Boy, oh, boy, home was nothin' like this!

Mine was.

Sign here.

All right, I don't want to start|those bells ringing!

(bells ring)

I wonder where I report.

(dog howls)

Oh, I always hoped there would be dogs.

(# plaintive flute music )

(# gentle, wistful tune)

Rate this script:5.0 / 1 vote

Michael Powell

Michael Latham Powell (30 September 1905 – 19 February 1990) was an English film director, celebrated for his partnership with Emeric Pressburger. Through their production company "The Archers", they together wrote, produced and directed a series of classic British films, notably 49th Parallel (1941), The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943), A Matter of Life and Death (1946, also called Stairway to Heaven), Black Narcissus (1947), The Red Shoes (1948), and The Tales of Hoffmann (1951). His later controversial 1960 film Peeping Tom, while today considered a classic, and a contender as the first "slasher", was so vilified on first release that his career was seriously damaged.Many film-makers such as Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola and George A. Romero have cited Powell as an influence. In 1981, he received the BAFTA Academy Fellowship Award along with his partner Pressburger, the highest honour the British Film Academy can give a filmmaker. more…

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Submitted on August 05, 2018

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