The Small Back Room (1949 Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger)

Another dead centre arrow (I'm beginning to think they all were), this is a strangely hypnotic film, from the extraordinary opening credits scene on (there's a shot here that I'm sure I remember hearing influences Taxi Driver), in part down to magnetic performances by David Farrar and Kathleen Byron. Micheal Gough too most sympathetic as fellow bomb disposer. With Jack Hawkins, Leslie Banks, Cyril Cusack, Renée Asherson, Sid James, Robert Morley.

Shot by Chris Challis, operated by Freddie Francis, edited by Reginald Mills and Clifford Turner, music Brian Easdale, production design Hein Heckroth. No doubt Bunuel would have liked the meeting scene drowned out by road works, and there's similar noise pollution in under stairs discussion between Farrar and Cusack. Clock / bottle scene and Chesil Bank (Beach) bomb finale also stand out. Use of objects in flat - photo, clock, bottle, phone - brilliantly well done. Based on a novel by Nigel Balchin.

In a 1968 interview, Powell tells Bertrand Tavernier that he thinks it's his best film. Apart from the surrealist bottle / clock scene, the critics loved it, but the public had no longer an appetite for a grim war film, and it was a flop.