The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp

Hated by Churchill and only revived in its full-length Technicolor glory in the 1970s, Powell and Pressburger’s beautifully rendered epic of male friendship transforms a satire of Britain’s military class in the first 40 years of the 20th century into an elegiac (if often comic) history of changing times and disappearing values. One of the key and most ambitious films produced during World War II, its exotic expressiveness was at odds with the realistic temper of its day. Featuring outstanding performances by Roger Livesey as the staunch, blustery colonel, Deborah Kerr as the three women in his life, and Anton Walbrook as his German best friend.