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Thelma Schoonmaker

Legendary Film Editor Celebrates Late Husband Michael Powell by Debuting The Doc "Made in England: The Films of Powell and Pressburger" at Tribeca Fest and More

By Brad Balfour

Maybe I should have attended the opening night screening of Black Narcissus when Oscar-winning director Martin Scorsese introduced the Museum of Modern Art's [MoMA] retrospective of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressberger films, but I didn't. Instead, I made it the next night to see legendary film editor, Thelma Schoonmaker, share her thoughts about Powell – her late husband – when the institution screened Made in England: The Films of Powell and Pressburger.

But hell, Marty was the sole narrator of this definitive documentary, so we hear him speak throughout a whole film celebrating the late Michael Powell and his partner, Emeric Pressburger, directed by David Hinton. In fact, Schoonmaker was introduced to Powell by Scorsese and his London-based film producer, Frixos Constantine. The couple were married from May 19, 1984, until his death in 1990. Since they had no children, Schoonmaker has been devoting herself to honoring and preserving the legacy of the many classic films that Powell directed.

Born in January 1940, this American film editor is best known for her five decades-long collaboration with Scorsese. Schoonmaker started working with Scorsese on his 1967 debut feature film, Who's That Knocking at My Door, and has edited all of his films since 1980's Raging Bull. Awarded many accolades, she has won three Academy Awards, two BAFTA Awards, and four ACE Eddie Awards. The 84-year-old has been honored with a British Film Institute Fellowship in 1997, the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement in 2014, and the BAFTA Fellowship in 2019.

In close collaboration with the British Film Institute (BFI), MoMA has been screening a comprehensive retrospective honoring this legendary filmmaking duo, creators of such classic films as The Red Shoes, A Matter of Life and Death and Black Narcissus.

Powell's controversial 1960 film Peeping Tom was so vilified on first release that it seriously damaged his career, but it's now considered a classic and a contender for the first "slasher movie." Besides Scorsese, many renowned filmmakers such as Francis Ford Coppola and George A. Romero have cited Powell as an influence.

In 1981, he received the BAFTA Fellowship along with partner Pressburger – the highest honor the British Academy of Film and Television Arts can bestow upon filmmakers. This series – the largest and most wide-ranging exploration of their work ever undertaken – celebrates the duo's cultural legacy and enduring influence. It features several 35mm prints, as well as new digital restorations of such Powell and Pressburger classics as The Small Back Room, The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp and The Tales of Hoffmann. Rarely screened films from Powell's late period will include Oh... Rosalinda!!, The Battle of the River Plate, Peeping Tom, and his long-unavailable 1963 adaptation of Bela Bartok's opera, Bluebeard's Castle. The latter two are newly restored by the BFI National Archive and the Film Foundation.

These true cinematic visionaries and innovators worked together on 24 films between 1939 and 1972, with Powell directing and Pressburger responsible for the scripts – though their duties blended often enough. For the films they produced together as The Archers, their credit reads "Directed and written by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger." The Archers worked with an exceptionally talented group of longtime collaborators who helped to craft and deliver their narrative worlds.

When Schoonmaker introduced the doc at MoMA, she offered these comments:

"I'm very glad that you are going to have a chance to see what it's like when I work with Marty. From the time I met him, he talked about the films of Powell and Pressburger. And when videos finally came around, he would send me home with one from the editing room so I could actually see why he was so excited. Of course, when I saw the films, I became as excited as he was. When he introduced me to Michael Powell at a dinner, while we were editing Raging Bull, I was stunned by him. "Much to the amazement of everyone, including Michael and myself, we began a relationship and eventually married. Michael was with us in New York from The King of Comedy until the film Goodfellas. He loved being back in the film world, and his presence meant so much to Marty as you will see in the documentary. So here's just a few notes, [then] we can get into the documentary about Michael's time with us in New York.

"We have all these great masterpieces to try and get down to a length that's reasonable. Michael would stop me on the street in New York sometimes and demand indignantly, "Why isn't Mean Streets being run every day somewhere in New York City?" He thought it was a masterpiece. He's right.

"Michael gave us the ending for After Hours. We didn't have a strong ending, and some people were giving us ideas like Cheech and Chong should fly away in a balloon. But Michael said no. Richard Dunn has to go back to the hell where we first saw him, teaching someone how to use a computer when what he really wants to do is write a great American novel. That's what Marty shot.

"When The Last Temptation of Christ was under such severe attack even before it was released, we had to have bodyguards for Marty. Marty finally let Michael see an almost finished edit of the film. He was always so worried about showing Michael any edits of our films because he said if he doesn't like it, I'm going to jump out the window. At the end, Michael stood up and there were tears streaming down his face. And I thought, what an incredible gift that was for Marty to be given at that terrible time.

"Most importantly, when Marty couldn't sell Goodfellas to the studios, if you can believe that, because they said he had to take the drugs out. He said, 'I can't.' That's the story. So I think that's in the editing room when I told Michael about it. He got very upset. He said he was ferociously protective of Marty's artistic rights because of what he, himself, had suffered. "And he told me to read him the script. When I finished, he said, get Marty on the phone. When I did, he said to Marty, "This is the best script I've read in 20 years. You have to make it." Marty went in one last time and got it made. Can you imagine if Goodfellas had never been made? But Michael did not live to see it.

"In return, what Marty has done for Michael and Emeric, is so enormous. Nobody's done as much as him to bring the films of Powell and Pressburger back from oblivion, in which they lingered for more than 20 years. He brought Michael Powell to the US, took him to film festivals where he got awards, entered Peeping Tom into the New York Film Festival in 1980, arranged for its re-release in America. And through his film foundation, he has raised the funds to restore eight of the Powell-Pressburger films. That is only a small list of what he has done through the years.

"So when Nick Varley, one of the producers of Made in England: the Films of Powell and Pressburger, suggested making a documentary about them, Marty and I were thrilled. We knew that it should be directed by David Hinton, who had already made a lovely film for the South Bank show on British TV about Michael Powell, when he was still alive and when his autobiography was published. Hinton took everything Marty had ever said or written about Powell and Pressburger and in conjunction with Marty, skillfully created the beautiful script you are about to see.

"David also insisted that Marty should be the only host in the documentary. No talking heads. How right he was. When Marty and I finished working on that little film, Killers of the Flower Moon, We joined into a wonderful collaboration with David and his editor Margarida Cartaxo. Edits flew back and forth across the Atlantic. It was a great joy for me to be living with the great films that I loved so much. You'll see a long list of organizations that funded the documentary, for which we are very grateful. With special thanks to George Harrison's widow, Olivia, who came in at the end to give us a much-needed boost.

"Just in time, for there is an explosion of interest in the films of Powell and Pressburger around the world. The British Film Institute, at the end of last year, put on a major retrospective of their films. Large numbers of young people attended the packed screenings and events. Now, MoMA, collaborating with the BFI, has put on an equally major retrospective for you all to see.

“We are so grateful to Dave Kehr, Olivia Priedite, and Sean Egan for the huge job of getting 50 films here for us all. And because of the amazing interest in the documentary, it is being distributed around the world, even in Beijing, where they screened it three times. We are so grateful to Altitude Movie and Cohen Media for making this possible.

"To end, I want to give my undying thanks to Marty, for letting me help him edit 22 of his movies, for initiating me into the Powell-Pressburger cult and for giving me the most wonderful husband in the world."

In addition, after Tribeca Festival debuted Made in England/The Films of Powell & Pressburger, MoMA's retrospective began. In presenting the doc there, Schoonmaker answered a few questions from a moderator about the film:

What is it like watching this?

Oh, it's so emotional. This film was made with quite a few people who really love Powell. It came out of years of Marty sending me home with videos of their movies and educating me about them and talking about them all the time. The producer of this film, Nick Varley, suggested to me that we make a documentary about it because of the wonderful celebration of Powell and Pressburger last year in England, in which I participated a lot.

Now MoMA is doing exactly the same celebration. They're going to run 50 films of these men. I never get tired of these movies and was so thrilled to be part of it. Marty's deep emotion about this movie is just what makes it so strong. Nobody ever did more to bring Powell and Pressburger back to the world than Marty. Many other people – Ian Christie, Kevin Goff Yates, Bertrand Tavernier – did great work to bring it back. But it was Marty who really, because of his ability to create publicity for them, made sure that the Museum of Modern Art ran a retrospective many years ago. Getting Peeping Tom reissued, all these things Marty did. Then he introduced my husband to me. It's an amazing thing to share with you all. And I do hope you'll go and see things at the Museum of Modern Art. Yes, definitely.

This is such a fascinating documentary, and it's very much a love story from Scorsese to them.

When I went to the celebration in England, there were so many young people there. I would look out at the audience, and half of them would be young people. They are coming in droves to these meetings. They're rediscovering them. I went up to Toronto to show this documentary, and after that they ran 10 films of Powell and Pressburger. They said it was packed with young people. Michael and Emmerich would be so thrilled to know that. Any time would have been the right time, but we seem to have accidentally hit a particular moment. That is wonderful.

Talk a little bit about the decision to tell the story of Powell and Pressberger's career through the lens of another filmmaker?

I think David – this movie's wonderful director – said that he wanted Marty to be the host. He didn't want a lot of talking heads. But he said, "No, I just want one person. I want Marty to do it." Of course, we agreed. I think he was absolutely right.

He's been a champion for their films for such a long time. you can really feel the love and connection to their films through his films.

Yes, I think he's probably one of the best working filmmakers who can talk about film.

You made an interesting choice with the film to highlight just a few of the films. Do you think that there is one film that you could pick that is the most meaningful or most special to you from Powell and Pressburger?

I hate that question because that's like saying, which of your children do you like best? I love them all. But my personal favorite is The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, which I accidentally saw when I was 15. We weren't allowed to watch TV except when our mother chose what we should watch at night. But my mother worked as a nursery schoolteacher, and I got home before her from high school, and I turned on this wonderful million-dollar movie that Marty talks about in the documentary where they ran the same film nine times in one week. Marty would try and watch them nine times unless his mother got fed up and stopped him. I just happened to turn on the TV and there was this amazing film. I will never forget it. It just marked me so deeply. Little did I know that I would, many years later, meet the director and marry him.

Michael's personal favorite was A Matter of Life and Death. He loved being a magician and he could do anything he wanted in that movie. Create heaven and earth, forget all about continuity and the things we're supposed to do when we make films. Just do what was right. Of course, Rex Ingram – the director that he worked with at the Victorine Studios when he was young – had inspired him with this love of magic. So that was his favorite.

Made in England: The Films of Powell & Pressburger Opens Friday, July 12th Q&As with Thelma Schoonmaker, 7/12 & 7/13 The Quad 34 W 13th St. New York, NY 10011 Contact: [email protected]

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