THE BOY WHO TURNED YELLOW

Powell and Pressburger returned to fantasy for their final film...

Michael Powell and emeric Pressburger made their first film together in 1939 and their last in 1972. Despite their lofty status in the 1940s, Powell’s reputation in particular took a bashing with his controversial (but now revered) 1960 picture,

Peeping Tom. So, it’s somewhat staggering to note that the final film of that great cinema partnership was a low-budget fantasy made for the Children’s Film Foundation. The Boy Who Turned Yellow was directed by Powell from a script by Pressburger and told the story of a boy who, after losing his pet mouse, encounters a yellow man who can travel through electricity. A little of the old magic shines through in its dreamy view of ’70s London, but it’s a fairly sorry end to a career that, three decades previously, outshone everything else around it.