Begegnung

Steam ... cut-glass accents ... Rachmaninov's 2nd Piano Concerto ... the refreshment room at Milford Junction ... "the shame of the whole thing - the guiltiness, the fear ..." - it all adds up to David Lean's famous film treatment of the Noel Coward tale of love blossoming and withering at a suburban railway station. Laura Jesson is a complacent middle-class housewife who gets a piece of grit in her eye one day and is helped by Doctor Alec Harvey, and the romance begins.

Coward's screenplay is characteristic of his oeuvre. There is the neat precision of the circular plot, beginning and ending with the brainless intrusion of Dolly Messiter, and the matching sub-plot of the Albert-Mrs. Bagot courtship. There are tongue-in-cheek self-references (on the cinema screen, "Flames Of Passion" coming shortly) and the trademark Cowardian grounding in exaggerated Englishness ("One has one's roots, after all"). Most typical of all is that overwrought cascade of middle-class vocabulary (" ...so utterly humiliated and defeated, and so dreadfully, dreadfully ashamed"). Coward patronises working-class people abominably. Albert and Mrs. Bagot amble effortlessly through their romance because, bless them, they are simple folk. Alec and Laura suffer torments, having so much more sensitivity, and, you see, they have reputations to lose ("the furtiveness and the lying outweigh the happiness").

Having made the transition from editor to director in 1942, Lean was at the helm for the fourth time for "Brief Encounter", all four films being Coward projects - and a highly creditable job he made of this one. The scene in which Alec explains coal-dust inhalation and Laura falls in love is a model of sensitive direction. Reflections of Laura's face in the train window and the make-up mirror suggest in visual terms the existence of her 'other self', the id to her ego. Thundering steam trains and Rachmaninov stand for the irrepressible sexual urge. Stephen Lynn's flat, with its bachelor urbanity, contrasts cleverly with Laura's safe, staid home and safe, staid husband Fred ("I don't understand!") Alec's silent hand on Laura's shoulder is wonderfully poignant, the suppressed emotion eclipsed by stupid Dolly Messiter, her face filling the screen and 'wiping out' the great moment.

Sex has to be dealt with obliquely, but it is very much the driving-force of the film. "If we control ourselves, and behave like sensible human beings ..." offers Laura hopefully but hollowly. Neither man nor woman is capable of restraint, at least until after the climax in Stephen's flat. The boathouse and the little bridge hint furtively at sexual union. Other reviewers have declared the liaison to be 'unrequited' or 'unconsummated', but I am not so sure. In the grammar of 1940's cinema, the return to the love-nest of tousle-haired, hatless Laura is the equivalent, I would suggest, of our modern bedroom scene. Isn't that why Alec suddenly decides to take the job offer?

I found this David Lean version of BRIEF ENCOUNTER to be a simply enchanting and entrancing film. Part of the enjoyment was the style of writing and acting that is purposely theatrical in order for the 1940s British subject matter to be handled in the fairly explicit way that it was. For those who 'don't get it' or find it boring well what can those who do 'get it' say? How sad perhaps that something so lovely and so humane and so complex in its dialogue and beautifully formal in its British tone cannot be enjoyed by a few who demand ..DEMAND.. it suit them in 2009. Hilarious! Maybe the multiplex mind thought BRIEF ENCOUNTER was about colliding underpants, which just might be right for them. CLASH OF THE TIGHT'UNS anyone? Maybe a remake with Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore called HERE/NOW might be the right update. This gloriously stuffy and furtive Noel Coward play is transformed in this film to be the black and white smoky British damp equivalent of HUMORESQUE or NOW VOYAGER.. and if you love those films (so easy!) you will love this.

I didn't think I'd write this comment till I saw the 2 previous ones criticizing 'BE'. I don't know how much this movie would appeal to camp-followers of an in-your-face go-getting culture. Some of the frequent adjectives describing this movie is 'civilised', 'restrained', 'noble'. To those who call this movie dated, I'll say that these are indeed qualities which are hardly followed & upheld today, especially in movies. However movies do reflect contemporary social mores, & maybe the story of two illicit lovers sacrificing their love for something as obvious as home & family does not find to many buyers today.

For those who think a movie can convey some of the most intimate emotions, conflicts & visions known to us, those who believe 2 art forms (Rachmaninoff's 2nd, Lean's 4th) can coexist brilliantly, & finally for those who believed David Lean got body-snatched in mid-career to make over-blown nonsense like 'Dr. Zhivago' this is one of the best ways to spend 86 minutes!

There's not a lot to say. Like many classics this film is simply constructed with all the elements in balance so that none stands out. Everything in it contributes something essential; the lighting, the unromantic railway station sets, the minor characters and of course the music, the ultra-romantic Rachmaninov Piano Concerto no 2. The emotional rollercoaster of the illicit affair has seldom been better portrayed. Perhaps it is a little understated for transatlantic tastes but no-one viewing this movie would not appreciate that the English can be as passionate as the rest of us.

Celia Johnson as Laura and Trevor Howard as Alec are perfect together. It being 1945, they do not get to bed – that would have ruined the audience's sympathy for them in those rather more censorious times. It's all in their minds but their faces give the game away – to each other and to the bystanders. Nothing happens to drag anyone near the awful divorce courts, but you are left wondering whether Celia will ever feel quite the same about her dull, comfortable, patronising and boring husband. As for Alec, he professes he will love her forever but then, he's a man.

Noel Coward produced this film from a short play of his from 1935 (the war and post-war shortages are absent), and his dulcet tones may be recognised in the railway station announcements. David Lean directed, and it is a remarkable collaboration. The action is opened out a little – a row on the lake, a drive in the country - but the scenes from the play set entirely in the railway refreshment rooms still remain the centre of the story. The parallel relationship between Albert the station guard (Stanley Holloway), and Myrtle the refreshment room attendant (Joyce Carey), is an interesting counterpoint to the angst-ridden middle class would-be adulterers. Surely Noel old boy you weren't suggesting that the working class handles this sort of thing better? We see things largely from Laura's point of view and perhaps Alec didn't feel quite so guilty, but their consciences are going to make them pay. A gem of a movie.

For me,a film addicted"Brief Encounter" is a polished diamond.It's the most perfect romance:You don't see lovers climbing balconys or dying in each others hand.What you see in "Brief Encounter"is two ordinary people in love.Only two normal people who stumble on one another in a railroad station and discover that they have more things in common,then meets the eye.So they started to see each other once a week,but their love are doomed,because they are both married and have very good lives.Celia Johnson is a sparklling gem as a house wife repressed who finds a man so repressed as she.That leads us to Trevor Howard.I know the reason of Celia's anguish.A normal woman simply could not resist to those eyes and the perfect face of Trevor,who embodies every english man in a simple wave,or just laughing in the theater.David Lean's soberb direction and Noel Coward's perfect story give space to show that you don't need to be Romeo And Juliet to tell that love's a good cause to fight,even when the fight is lost