Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3253 in DVD
• Released on: 2003-07-07
• Rating: Universal, suitable for all
• Formats: Black & White, PAL
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 91 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
Having seen I Know Where I'm Going, Martin Scorsese (a huge fan of filmmakers Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger) declared that there were no more classics to be made in cinema. The film tells the story of Wendy Hiller's unromantic but determined young bride-to-be Joan Webster, setting forth to the Isle of Mull to marry an elderly millionaire. However, on reaching Kiloran she's prevented by adverse weather from reaching the island and must bunk down in a hotel with naval lieutenant and, it transpires, penniless Laird Torquil McNeil (Roger Livesey).

It's not hard to predict the outcome of this saga but getting there is a wonderful journey. Hiller, more famous for playing less pretty elders in later life in the likes of Murder on the Orient Express, is splendid as the softening pragmatist, while Livesey, frequently used by Powell/Pressburger, again embodies a combination of British no-nonsense decency and romanticism. The strongest, most magical presence in the movie, even in black and white, is that of the Scottish scenery, beautiful and volatile and somehow serving to aid and abet the happy ending. --David Stubbs

DVD Description
Wendy Hillier stars in Powell and Pressburger’s classic romantic comedy about a young woman who discovers the true meaning of wealth. Joan Webster has her life mapped out, beginning with marriage to a rich industrialist. Her plans go wrong when she finds herself stranded on the way to a remote Scottish island and falls in love with a penniless young sailor. Filmed on location in the Isle of Mull, the fourth collaboration between Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger (The Red Shoes, A Matter of Life and Death) is one of their best-loved movies.

Special Features
English
Region 2

Customer Reviews

Marvellous love story set in the Scottish Highlands
This is a classic Powell and Pressburger film (1945 in B&W). A magical love story set in the Scottish Highlands, it tells the tale of Joan (Hiller), a headstrong young woman who knows her own mind and is used to getting her own way and who decides to marry an older millionaire industrialist on a remote Scottish island (which he has rented during the war). En route she runs into an impoverished Scottish laird (Livesey)and it seems that all the forces of nature conspire to make them fall in love and achieve a happy ending of a kind she hadn't envisaged. A simple tale, brilliantly told and much the better for DVD conversion. Totally captivating.

Nostalic, enchanting, beautiful
I love this little gem of a film. It's a romance about a spirited and somewhat annoying and stubborn young woman (Wendy Hiller), who becomes engaged to a wealthy older man, simply because it is materially advantageous for her to do so. She travels to the Western Isles of Scotland, hoping to meet up with her fiancé, but when the bad weather keeps her stranded, she encounters the local laird (played by the wonderful Roger Livesey), and her plans, as well as her feelings begin to go awry.

The story will at first, seem rather quaint and old fashioned to the modern viewer, as will the character's mannerisms and speech, but the film captures a wonderful mythic, fairytale atmosphere, which is both nostalgic and enchanting. It's also a metaphorical love story, a scathing critique of materialism, just as relevant to us today as it was back in the 1940s.

Much of the film is shot on location, using local people as extras - though, incredibly the scenes with Livesey were all done in the studio. Powell's sensitive feel for myth and landscape yields some extraordinarily haunting and beautiful scenes, and the dream sequence is ingenious and delightful - it's a technical masterpiece, admired by all the great directors of today, including Scorcese. A film that will appeal to aspiring movie-makers and those who still have romance in their souls!

Be sure to obtain the Criterion version.
"I know where I'm going,
I know who's going with me,"

A young lady (Windy Hiller) pretty much knows what she wants in life. On her way to her wedding on a remote Scottish island she is delayed long enough to experience a different way of life and a reality that she was never exposed to. Here she finds different values and the difference between real nobility and the early version of plastic money. She is overwhelmed by her new discovery and the man (Roger Livesey) who introduced her to it. Now she must desperately escape or be lost forever in this different world.

I was surprised to find that a young girl in the movie was Petula Clark.

There are advantages to having a movie with a story that is not based on a book. You can enjoy the story for what it is and not have to compare. However this may make a good play. In the Criterion extras you will find speculation on the pro's and con's of remaking the movie.

This film is impressive on its own but the Criterion treatment adds many fascinating dimensions that make you have to re-watch the film just to se the parts that you missed while paying attention though the plotline and scenery.

There is a commentary track that covers the entire film. A behind the scenes stills that even has a commentary. Home movies add to the information about the designers of the story and producers. There is a section from "The edge of the World." A great insight and a different way off looking at the story are found in "I Know Where I'm Going! Revisited" a 30 minute making of. The location photo essay allows you to see if the color is what you imagined (maybe better).