The Small Back Room

This monochrome release from Powell and Pressburger is a much more subdued affair — but that diminished scale suits a film about a kind of stiff-upper-lip domestic heroism which was understated, unseen and largely unsung during the war years,

The strength and confidence in Powell and Pressburger’s film-making is a pleasure -- as is their distinctive love of adventure and romance.

One of the period's most piercing, emotionally anguished romances.

An atypically modest, B&W drama that nonetheless has great power, and surprise flights of noirish surrealism...

...the kind of old-school drama whose technique and craft put to shame some modern filmmaking

Every frame of the film is exquisite and moves the story along – the expressionistic lighting also tells the story.

It is a pleasure to find once more in the new Powell-Pressburger film, The Small Back Room, the old qualities: the irony of character, the tension of situation. A pleasure also to find Powell and Pressburger dealing with material worthy of them.

The most terrific suspense is achieved during this last sequence which more than compensates for any of the film's shortcomings.

The Small Back Room is too good to be regarded as the curio that most currently see it as.

Through the Archers' gaze we watch closely, but are never let in.