Blithe Spirit was considered a disappointment by many of its participants, including producer Anthony Havelock-Ellen, who believed it miscast (many of the cast, including Rex Harrison and Margaret Rutherford, seemed to agree), and Noël Coward, who had resisted approaches from Hollywood in favour of Lean, only to accuse the director of ruining what he believed to be his best play. Despite this, this supernatural comedy in which novelist Charles Condomine (Harrison) finds his second marriage interrupted by the ghost of his first wife (Kay Hammond) following Madame Arcati’s (Rutherford) séance stands as one of Lean’s most enduring and popular films.

Screening as part of The Films of David Lean season.