Brief Encounter- the film

[Orangesandlemons77]

We watched this film on TV last night. DH confided in me he used to watch it years ago, over and over and had been in tears over it.

To be honest I didn't really like it. A bit boring. All about an emotional affair between two random people in the 1940s who meet in a train station and go to the pictures etc despite having husbands / wives and children at home.

It just went on and on and then finishes with them saying goodbye and her crying in the arms of her husband who she has been lying to throughout.

AIBU?

Not in the 1940s, surely? That's how it was in the early Victorian period and then the law changed. My grandmother left her abusive husband in the mid 40s and took the children with her. My grandfather sued her for divorce on grounds of desertion. She could have counter-sued on grounds of his treatment of her (and I think also the children) but didn't because it would have got a lot of publicity (all divorces were reported in detail in the newspapers back then). Because he won he didn't have to pay her a penny in maintenance. She could have got a court order to make him pay maintenance for the children but she didn't (couldn't face it, I think) and he never paid a penny for them, nor did he ever see them or have any contact with them again. What an absolute bastard. However, as far as I know there was never any question that she might lose custody. That's probably the one thing that would have galvanised her into going to court.

So sad. She never married again and could scarcely talk about him. My Dad never talked about him to me or my brother, not once. He told my Mum shortly after they started going out and then I think never spoke of him again.

It's a beautiful film, it's so evocative of that period, and I think a lot of people (me included) can empathise with that feeling of "what if ...?" It's one of the films that has had me really thinking about the lives of the main protagonists before they met, when/as they met - and after they parted.

I like This Happy Breed too - I read an article where there were photographs from 1944 and from the present day of various locations in which the film was shot. That was interesting.

Gasp0de - oh I must’ve got it wrong. We know someone aged 82 whose mother left and didn’t see him until he was 18 so presumably the father persuaded the courts. Shocking really.

Gosh. I find both of them very attractive, in different ways. Trevor Howard was excellent in Green for Danger and The Third Man. For anyone looking for another classic black and white film with a compelling love story and terrific music, you can't do better than The Third Man, by the way.

Yes, I think the outcome was probably different if the mother left without the children. There were also cases until amazingly recently of the courts refusing to allow women to keep their children with them if they had left the father to embark on a lesbian relationship.

I've loved it ever since I watched it in Film Studies as a teenager. I think because I was forced to watch it all the way through I ended up enjoying it. If I'd not properly committed to watching it I'd probably think it was boring.

I don't understand the attraction with Alec though, her husband was much better! So that was a bit of a headscratcher for me....but I might be alone there!

I laugh like a loon when she shoves the mince pie into her own eye 😂

Oh I love that film - I watch it probably once a year on a rainy can’t really go for a walk on the hills afternoon. Plus I absolutely love an old black and white movie.

I agree! It’s perfect for a rainy winter afternoon- especially if there’s an open fire to sit by.

There’s another thread at the moment about favourite Hollywood films and if there are young pps on this thread I really recommend trying some of these classic old films - they’ve stood the test of time.

Sometimes the black and white photography and lighting can be super-glamorous.

it’s about real life as opposed to romantic fantasy.

Fred is the solid lump of comfort, to reference another current thread.

I agree about This Happy Breed (Celia Johnson and Stanley Holloway again). Robert Newton is excellent.

And The Third Man must be in anyone's list of best ever films. Like Casablanca and Brief Encounter, the music plays a large part.

Ahhh but my all time favourite is James Mason. Very different. I need a man to have ‘something of the night’ about him 😂.

I do remember finding BE very romantic the first time I saw it, when I was probably in my teens. It’s since discovering the paucity of romance in real life that I think I feel the need to shake Laura and demand she follow her heart.

Of course the sad thing is that if they’d actually done it and run away together they’d probably have discovered pretty quickly that actually they didn’t know each other that well, had nothing in common and the passion would have fizzled out very quickly. Everyone’s hearts would have been broken for nothing.

I saw it yesterday too. I haven't seen it for years. I have always loved it though.

I can't remember the first time I saw it, probably by mistake, I probably would have been in my 20's.

Compared to today, the love story is very tame! Apart from kiss, and the emotional aspect, it was relatively innocent in a physical sense. They fall in love after a few meetings.

I can see why even today people like this film now, lives can seem so mundane and boring, being a housewife, married with 2 children, she probably felt trapped. The thrill she must have felt, in her otherwise boring, routine life, dreaming of a fantasy that was unachievable. I think that's why people still like it!

Also when it was made, the War was still going on so a bit of fantasy and escapism would have been good. I think the music played throughout adds to it and makes it more emotional.

Yes I often get the train to Carnforth and it’s a shrine to Brief Encounter with a lovely cafe.

I think virtually everyone has a non-stop talking, gossiping acquaintance like Dolly Messister in the film though! You're left to wonder what would have happened if Dolly wouldn't have walked in, how different would the "goodbye" have been.

Of course she wishes Dolly was the type of person she could call a friend, someone she could confide in, instead of a non-stop chattering busy body.

Great film, rewatched it after we went to a steam train event this summer dressed in 1940’s attire. Waltzed on the train platform and had afternoon tea.

The young actor Margaret Barton that played Beryl the girl in the tea room is still alive and is 99.

Count me in please! 😂

How odd! He's my all-time favourite too. Trevor Howard is not unlike him. He usually plays characters whose lips are permanently curled. I think he was probably not one to suffer fools gladly in real life.

Oh they are all coming out now 😀

Ooh James Mason!

So handsome and - like James Stewart - another architecture graduate (Cambridge). He certainly had a distinct aura - inscrutable and sometimes sinister. He’s great in North by North West, and I also love that film for the superbly-cut suits of Cary Grant!

There was an excellent play on Radio 4 this week with Mark Gatiss doing an excellent job of playing James Mason in later years. Well worth catching. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m002jfc7

Im not sure about Trevor Howard, there's something dark about him. @FullLondonEye has it with "something if the night" I think I'd have felt nervous if I met him but no idea why. I can also see why he'd seem attractive as a smart man with a powerful force to him.

Thinking about actors James Garner was also a favourite. I remember my kids liking him in The Notebook and them being surprised when I said he was a heartthrob back in the day, I showed them a film of him as a young man (can't remember what) and they agreed he was a very handsome young man.

I think as a pp has said he's quite a bully to her in the film.

He seems quite charming though so maybe it comes over as interested & decisive?

Then he doesn't turn up one time & then doesn't let her end it when she wants so it's all on his terms!

Sorry, was just meant to be a joke. It made me think of Rachel's traditional British trifle