Having on occasion been berated as a barbarian for not having seen certain cinematic classics, I have striven mightily to improve myself in this regard. The other night, my S.O. and I sat down to watch Brief Encounter, a film that we both knew to be regarded as a masterwork, but about which we were otherwise ignorant. As the closing credits rolled, each of us looked at the other, and, finally overcoming our reluctance to prove ourselves cultural philistines, wondered aloud what the heck was the big deal. Okay, it was heavy on atmosphere. The use of the train station as the setting for a lovers’ many farewells is a well-established film cliché – one of the mainstays of classic cinema. But aside from this, it seemed utterly lacking in any memorable quality. The story was pure soap opera. The two central lovers did little more than a) express their undying passion for one another, and b) agonize over how guilty they felt.
So, cinephiles one and all. Why is this film regarded as such a classic? Okay, the Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto #2 was put to good effect (it’s one of my favorite pieces), but what else am I supposed to take from this?
I’m not a cinéaste, and I confess I have only seen bits of Brief Encounter, but I have seen enough documentaries about the movie to declare that it’s all about context. It was about an overwhelming passion without the ability to express it - the strictures of British society at the time meant that a wild affair was out of the question. Not only that, but the loyalty to the respective families was a moral choice on which the story impinges. And its subject, infidelity (even in the mind) was seen as incredibly racy at the time of its release.
Plus, the cliché of the train station as the place for lovers’ farewells was pretty much started by this movie.
I like it a lot- it’s one of the few romantic movies that’s not a totally sappy cliche-fest. I usually detest romance pictures, but this one is really well done, probably because it European it doesn’t have the standard American movie cliches. And the ending where the woman goes home and hugs her husband without saying anything is pretty much perfect. Its just a solid, well made and well acted movie, nothing revelatory about it.
The woman lead does a particularly good job of depicting how a woman of that time would act were she really doing this.
You made the mistake of watching this movie out of context. Back then, infidelity was a major indiscretion, and to be labeled an adulterer (or worse, an adulteress) was totally shocking. Plus, it was happening to two upstanding individuals who were as far as possible from the “type” who’d engage in an adulterous affair, even considering their unsatisfying marriages. And neither of them intended to fall in love with the other, it just happened, beyond their control. And I can’t think of another movie that so totally conveys the experience of longing for something one needs, but can never have.
If nothing else, it’s worth watching for the superb acting and direction.
That movie could never be made today. They’d just jump into bed right away, and there’d be no point in continuing.
Exactly. Plus, for this American, what made the context of the affair so deliciously stressful was the clear sense that was given of how the *Britishness *of the characters made it so much harder. It seems to me, even with the copies it’s spawned over the years, to be one of the least cliche, most emotionally honest romance movies of all time.