Stairway To Heaven aka A Matter of Life and Death - Movie Review

Stairway to Heaven / A Matter of Life and Death (1946) is a romantic fantasy film created by the British writing-directing-producing team of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, and set in England during the Second World War. The film stars David Niven, Roger Livesey, Raymond Massey, Kim Hunter and Marius Goring.

British flyer Peter Carter's plane is damaged while returning to England from a bombing run in May 1945 and his parachute is ripped to shreds. He has his crew bail out safely, but figures its 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 mix up in heaven. They couldn't find him in all that damn fog. By the time his Conductor 71 catches up with him more than 20 hours later, Peter and June have met and fallen in love. However, Peter now suffers hallucinations of death trying to take him away and June realizes Peter has suffered brain damage, he needs medical help, an operation, and during this operation Heaven agrees to a trial to decide his fate.

Since Peter has survived through no fault of his own, he figures that heaven should give him a second chance.

Will he get another chance to live and love?

This is a Color and BW film. This same film was titled A Matter of Life and Death for British release and titled Stairway to Heaven for US release.

The use of BW and Color is gimmicky even for its day, and depicting the Heavenly hereafter in BW rather than color was probably not the wisest choice. Regardless, this is a fantasy film worth watching, because if for no other reason David Niven is just a cool cat in any flick.

• David Niven as Squadron Leader Peter David Carter
• Kim Hunter as June
• Roger Livesey as Dr. Frank Reeves
• Kathleen Byron as an Angel
• Richard Attenborough as an English Pilot
• Bonar Colleano as an American Pilot
• Joan Maude as Chief Recorder
• Marius Goring as Conductor 71
• Robert Coote as Flying Officer Bob Trubshawe
• Robert Atkins as the Vicar
• Bob Roberts as Dr. Gaertler
• Edwin Max as Dr. Mc Ewan
• Betty Potter as Mrs. Tucker, Reeves' housekeeper
• Raymond Massey as Abraham Farlan
• Abraham Sofaer as The Judge

The film was released in late 1946 and did well for the next few months at the box office.

See the film at Stairway to Heaven on YouTube or Stairway to Heaven on FFilms.org