I Know Where I'm Going! (1947)

Too many fans seem to be blown away

That was an excellent one.

Purely Joyful Movie!

It’s an especially fun movie from a director and cast who are clearly having a good time allowing themselves to let loose.

Although Roger Livesey is usually not your typical leading man he steps out of class here and delivers as a fine performance as the rugged Scot sea captain who makes Wendy Hiller his own. As for Wendy Hiller. I Know Where I'm Going is one of her best films, she delivers a fine performance as a young woman who up to her mid 20s knows exactly what she wants.What she wants to get to a private island in the New Hebrides up in Scotland, privately owned by a titled millionaire who has her as a trophy bride in his declining years. But she gets stuck on one the mainland as the seas get rough and no Scot with a brain in his head is willing to risk any kind of sea craft in a storm. Especially since there's a nasty old whirlpool that's sucked many craft to Davy Jones locker.So Hiller is spending some enforced time in Scotland and while it might not be the green Scotland of Brigadoon the sea coast and the people do have a charm of their own. This is the greatest strength of I Know Where I'm Going, the accurate and colorful depiction of the Scottish fisher folk and their ways.The second are some really hair raising sequences involving Hiller and Livesey when they finally do make an attempt to get to that private island. By that time both of them are having second thoughts.This is one pleasant and charming film, a must for fans of Wendy Hiller. s

Set against the backdrop of a very distant seeming World War II, this is an excellent romantic drama. The plot is relatively simple but the script by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger is very well written and extremely engaging. It presents us with a charming, almost mystical story of the relaxed pace of life on the Hebrides through the eyes of a stubborn Englishwoman who sees little value in it. The direction is as excellent as I have to come to expect from the duo and the film makes great use of the beautiful scenery of the Isle of Mull. The fantastic cinematography, another Powell and Pressburger trademark, is provided by Erwin Hillier on this occasion and adds a great deal to the film.The film stars Wendy Hiller in a first rate performance as the upwardly mobile Joan Webster, a headstrong, independent 25-year-old woman from Manchester who is to be married the exceedingly wealthy and considerably older industrialist Sir Robert Bellenger on the Hebridean island of Kiloran. However, her marriage plan hits a bit of a snag when she is essentially stranded on the neighbouring Isle of Mull for days on end due to a severe gale. She finds it particularly frustrating since she can easily see Kiloran and she could get there in half an hour. Weather permitting. Joan is rather unimpressed by Mull, considering it a bleak and desolate place and an obstacle to her plan. She is incredibly stubborn and does not accept that it is simply not possible to get to Kiloran. At times, she is not a very likable character as she is perfectly willing to put the lives of others at risk to suit herself, even going so far as to compare her desire to reach Kiloran to a rescue operation during a terrible storm. As such, she is extremely selfish person. She always seems to get what she wants and cannot abide it when things do not go her way. It is so heavily implied that Sir Robert's charm and scintillating personality were not the things that first attracted her to him that there might as well have been a ticker tape at the bottom of the screen announcing it every two minutes! However, she softens as the film progresses. There is a great deal of character development in the film, particularly towards the end, as Joan realises that there is more to life than vaulting ambition. For the first time in her life, she recognises that she does always have to plan everything down to the last detail in order to be happy. In fact, this approach can be counterproductive.Roger Livesey gives a typically excellent performance as Torquil MacNeil, the Laird of Kiloran and a Royal Navy officer who seeks to return home for the first time in four years for some shore leave. When they take shelter in the home of his childhood friend Catriona Potts, Torquil becomes attracted to Joan. He takes advantage of the fact that they are cut off from Kiloran to woo her, using all of the charm and wit at his disposal to do so. While Joan is attracted to him as well, she is single-minded to the point of myopia and she sees him as another obstacle in her plan to become Lady Bellenger. In many respects, most particularly his high degree of common sense, Torquil is her opposite number, proving that opposites really do attract. One of the best scenes in the film is their very heated argument in which he attempts to convince her of the dangerous stupidity of taking a boat to Kiloran in such weather and the immorality of putting another person's life at risk for her convenience. It is the more insightful Catriona, however, who points out that Joan is trying to get away from him as she has begun to realise that she is in love with him. He cannot prevent Joan from leaving but his sense of honour and responsibility means that he must accompany her. The two of them and the sailor Kenny barely manage to escape with their lives from the Corryvrecken whirlpool. Although all seems lost at one point, there is a heartwarming happy ending of the kind that a war British weary population would have loved and they are certainly not alone in that.The film has a strong supporting cast. The most notable actual Scots are Finlay Currie as the old sailor Ruairidh Mhór and Livesey's The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp co-star John Laurie as John Campbell. Pamela Brown is very good as the wise, sensible Catriona while Catherine Lacey is suitably obnoxious as Mrs. Robinson. The 12-year-old Petula Clark makes a great impression as her rather too precocious daughter Cheril. As a dog lover, I not only loved the customary appearance of Powell's gorgeous Golden Cocker Spaniels Erik and Spangle - one of whom looks just like my dog! - but the beautiful Irish Wolfhounds as well.Overall, this is a great feelgood film which reminds us that you cannot put a price tag on the most important things in life and, more to the point, you shouldn't try.

Have you ever fallen in love with a movie? In love with a film that speaks to your heart and your sense of whimsy? I have tried to recall what led me to this movie, to no avail. But, ohhh, I am so glad this movie came into my life. Because I have waited for such a movie all my life. It's a simple story: A youngish woman travels far from home to marry a rich man. But choppy waters delay her trip from the mainland to her intended's island. It's the atmosphere that makes it somewhat like a fairytale. Gaelic is spoken here and there. The fog moves in and out. The winds stir up the water and the grasses and trees. You can here the "seels" baying nearby. At a ceilidh, folk music is sung and two young lovers reconnect. In a mansion nearby, new money meets old money and the new money is looked down upon in subtle ways. I guess it was the fog that shrouds the landscape. It obscures the romantic tendencies in almost every character. Sometimes emotions erupt, as when a young girl pleads for a boat journey to be aborted so her lover won't die. So many things to watch for in this movie. Roger Livesey is at his best as the correct and courteous Torquil MacNeil, the master of the island he is renting out to Wendy Hiller's "rich man." As Joan Webster, Hiller, is an upward climber. The old money knows this and she resents it. The class undercurrents are numerous. I fell in love with this movie, perhaps, as the dock. When somber music wafts and fog shrouds the bay and the seafarers retreat to their homes, leaving Joan alone on the dock. When the wind snatches her itinerary into the water, its symbolism is not overdone. Perhaps that is what I like about this movie. Nothing much is overdone. People speak like people. Well, Gaelic people. And the upper crust is as much at home with the lower crust. And outsiders have to earn their way into that society. Poor Joan, she can't see that right away. I fell in love with this movie. I think, if you give it a chance, you will too.

Here's a film I would have never ventured to watch had I not come across it by accident on Turner Classic Movies. This woman, Joan Webster, played by Wendy Hiller, is off to Scotland to marry some guy she obviously doesn't know too well. We know this ourselves because she has dinner with her father the night before she's scheduled to leave for the Hebrides. Her father tries to tell her to slow down and think about it but she: "KNOWS WHERE SHE'S GOING." (She doesn't scream it, as implied by the caps. But she might as well have. The setup is movie perfection.) Joan has these directions to the island on which this guy has planned to marry her. She has to take the train from London to East Bumshoe, then another train from Bumshoe to Overloafen, a bus from Overloafen to Pudgydubby, a cab from Pudgyduddy to Shaddycrack, the ferry from there to some other weirdly named town, then the water taxi to yet another Scottish backwater, and finally a private skiff to the island. Unfortunately, when she gets there, it's thick of fog. Swirling, smoky, impenetrable fog. Fog like you won't believe, unless you live in Scotland or Great Britain or Maine, like I do. Or you own a Hollywood fog machine, or work in a Russian spa, or live next door to Sherlock Holmes. You get the point. So she can't get to the island. She has to stay at someone's house with a bunch of other people who are similarly stuck. At this point, we're only about five minutes into the film, which is just more of this movie's magic, because it's here she's dealt the classic "Call to Adventure" of the hero's journey. She meets a man, and not the one she's supposed to marry. The man is Torquil Macneil, played by Roger Livesey; he wears a kilt and speaks in a heavy Scottish brogue, and although he's not exactly the most handsome leading man you ever saw, he does wear a kilt and speak in a heavy Scottish brogue, which makes him, apparently, very hot. Don't get me wrong, he's always the perfect gentleman. It's 1945 for God's sake. Later that day, feeling rather threatened by this charming kilt-wearing Scotsman, she tries once again to get the boat to the island. She's told it's way to foggy but as soon as the wind comes around northwest, the fog will lift and they'll be able to go. That night, Joan, while lying in her bed at the Inn, prays for wind from the northwest. In the morning Joan wakes to find her prayers answered. The fog has cleared. Unfortunately, it's because of a full blown northwest gale, which ends up sticking around for more than a week. She never makes it to the island. This special gem of a movie is the product of one of the most creative collaborations in movie history, that of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. They had a gift for storytelling that is almost gone. Very often when you see a film today you're struck by inconsistencies, failures of logic, plot holes, gimmicks, etc. Or you're faced with a movie that just doesn't come together. Not the case with Powell and Pressburger films. Their movies have perfect structure; they engage you, keep moving toward a goal and wrap up all neat and tidy. If you ever see this one on the video rental shelf, grab it and take it home. I guarantee you won't be disappointed, especially if you're trying to score some points in the romance game.