Brief Encounter (1945) User Reviews

75 years later, it's still the most REAL romance ever put to film

[rooprect · 8/10 · 9 April 2021]

How many times have you been caught in a love triangle in the middle of a civil war while you lose your plantation home? How many times have you wandered into a bar in Morocco and gotten caught up in a lost love who is now married to a resistance fighter? If your answer is anything more than zero, then what the heck are you doing watching movies. "Brief Encounter" is a 1945 British film that shook the world of romance because the story is essentially so boring that real people immediately felt it in the core of their hearts. And 75 years later, I'm willing to bet that it'll grip you the same way.

Plot summary: two strangers meet briefly on a railway platform and soon realize that they are both there every Thursday at the same time. Over the course of several Thursdays, recognition becomes familiarity, familiarity becomes friendship, friendship eventually becomes love. But the problem is that they are both taken.

THIS, my romantic friends, is how love happens in the real world. It's not planned, not necessarily elegant, and in most cases it's not opportune. In a word, it's imperfect. The power of this film lies in the way this theme is brought to life. We are immersed in a world of mundane details. We eavesdrop on random conversations at the railway station, miniature dramas of everyday life, until we settle on the 2 protagonists and become interested in their story. The camera continues to remind us of how ordinary the world is, taking detours to sideshows and unrelated plots involving nonessential characters. But it's not boring because we know that this is how real life works. And before you know it, you are swallowed up in this world as if it's your own.

"Brief Encounter" is the sort of film that can make you feel like you're falling in love even if you've never been in love. Or it can remind you of that "what if" scenario you left in your own past. Excellent cinematography and lighting, along with the excellent acting, are icing on the cake. If you want to feel--or remember--what love is like, then this is your ticket.

It's no use pretending that it hasn't happened because it has

[sol-kay · 8/10 · 22 December 2006]

**SPOILERS** Meeting quite by accident at the Milford train station British housewife Laura Jesson, Celi Johnson, got a speck of grit stuck in her eye that fellow passenger Dr. Alec Harvey,Trevor Howard, quickly came to her aid and washed out. Alec then slowly starts to get these strong feeling about the sweet and somewhat shy, as well as married, middle-age woman that in no time at all turns into an uncontrollable, by both Laura as well as Alec, love affair that in the end if not checked my well break up both of their marriage's.

Even though both Alec and Laura are married, not to each other, we only get to see Laura's husband and family in the movie which is shown in a long flashback, that takes up almost the entire film, from only Laura's point of view. After that innocent meeting at the train station the two always end up meeting on a Thursday when Laura travels to Milford to buy groceries and Alec has the afternoon off from work. Alec a doctor at the Milford hospital has a wife and family who we never get to see but sense are very much in love with him. Alec's life starts to take a sudden turn away from them as he starts to slowly fall in love with Laura.

You never once get the impression that Alec and Laura are willing to leave their wife and husband so that they can get married to each other. The two star-struck lovers only want to keep their affair secret and live double-lives but the guilt of the affair consumes Laura. For the first time in her marriage Laura lied to her husband Fred, Cyril Raymond, about her being in love with another man. Even though she admitted it to Fred in an almost whimsical way, that Fred took as a joke, Laura also realized that no matter how much she was in love with Alec, and he with her, in the end it would only lead to nothing but heartbreak for her as well as everyone, Alec together with her and his families, involved.

It was later when Alec got a job at his brothers new hospital in Johannesburg South Africa that both he and Laura could finally break up their affair by the two never having to as much as cross their paths again. Even saying goodbye to each other for the last time was never to happen when the two were interrupted at the train station by Laura's chatter-house friend Dolly Mesitter, Everly Gregg. Dolly's non-stop talking prevented the two from having the last few minutes together with each other but at the same time also prevented Laura from throwing herself on the tracks, by momentarily keeping her mind off the fact that Alec was about to leave her, as Alec's train left the station.

Extremely moving adult drama about two persons who find out only too late in life that they were meant for each other but missed the boat, or train, when it came into the station and have to do with what they have: try to forget they ever met no matter how much sorrow and grief it would bring them. Both Celia Johnson and Trevor Howard were touchingly effective as the star-struck lovers Laura and Alec who knew that their affair was doomed from the start and just had to accept what fate had handed them: try to forget that brief encounter they had one fateful evening in the railroad station outside of Milford.

The 36 Year Old Celia Johnson

[richardchatten · 9/10 · 16 December 2019]

Filmmakers always yearn to make A Simple Love Story, and this was extravagantly praised in its day for being such a film (and itself pats itself on the back for it's understated, thoroughly British 'realism' when the guilty pair have a good laugh at the local pictures at a nonsensical piece of Hollywood hokum called 'Flames of Passion').

The accents sadly make it almost impossible for today's audiences to take seriously British films of the forties, but 'Brief Encounter' remains largely immune to the knee jerk ridicule most of its contemporaries are subject to; and people remain too polite to admit really it's 'just' a beautifully crafted weepie (with superb, sometimes stylised photography by Robert Krasker) which despite its much-vaunted lack of Hollywood schmaltz shamelessly tugs at the heartstrings with its crashing Rachmaninov score (which stays with you long after the film is over) and thoroughly enjoyable as such. (No 'just' about it!)

It functions equally well on whatever other level the viewer wishes it to. Knowing that Noel Coward played the male lead in the original 1936 West End production of his own play adds an obvious gay subtext to its tale of forbidden love; while despite being set before the war (the copyright date on 'Flames of Passion' is 1938) looks thoroughly wartime (especially Celia Johnson's chic, pre-New Look suit) and must have struck a chord with lonely wartime wives tempted to stray while their husbands were away on active service.

Now comes the moment where I must declare my own interest. I find Celia Johnson quite breathtakingly lovely and heartbreakingly moving at the core of the film, she looks terrific in that suit, and I could spend all day just looking into those big, sad, imploring eyes of hers...

Still life

[jotix100 · 10/10 · 18 January 2006]

Certain songs, or melodies, associated with films one has seen, stay in our sub conscience forever. This is the case with the Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto for this viewer. Any time we hear it, or parts of the main themes are played, it immediately evokes this romantic film of 1945. It's a tribute to its director, David Lean, that after more than sixty years, it still is one of the most cherished movie experiences for a lot of people that saw it, or that are just getting acquainted with it.

"Brief Encounter" owes it all to one of the best talent in the English speaking world of the last century: Noel Coward. As part of his "Tonight at Eight" theater work, this one act play, "Still Life" was turned by its author and David Lean into what we know as "Brief Encounter", a bittersweet account of two lovers, doomed from the start.

The film works because the exquisite chemistry between its two stars, Celia Johnson and Trevor Howard. Both these actors make Laura Jesson and Alec Harvey come alive and stay with us every time we view this timeless film. The story is not far fetched and is made real by the two stars that elevate it to one of the best films of all times. The movie is done with an impeccable sense of decorum and style, yet it has such a sexy subtext. That was a time when a film didn't have to "bare it all" in order to catch the viewer's imagination. In fact, Laura and Alec let us know, without being specific, about the passion that both feel for one another.

Celia Johnson was not a great beauty. Neither was Trevor Howard the epitome of handsomeness, yet, their scenes together project such a heat, as the one that their characters are feeling at any given moment. The fact the two illicit lovers are played by people one could relate to, is what makes the film resonate the way it does every time we watch it. Of course, we realize this situation had no future from the start, yet, one keeps hoping their love will end well.

The supporting cast is excellent. Stanley Holloway is seen as the station master Albert. Joyce Carey is perfect as the woman in charge of the refreshment area of the station where Laura and Alec spend some of their time together. Cyril Raymond makes Fred Jesson, a man who perhaps understand much more than what he lets know. Everly Gregg is seen as the chattering Dolly Messiter.

"Brief Encounter" is one of the best films directed by David Lean, a man who was able to give the film the right tone and made it the classic that it is.

Briefly, a great film

[Philby-3 · 20 June 2002]

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.

An excellent, charming, moving film.

[Lloyd-23 · 10/10 · 22 November 2000]

Have you really never seen Brief Encounter? What have you been doing all these years? You have a treat in store.

I have a great love for British films of the 1940s. There seems to have been a great flowering of creative talent then, and the films of the period look beautiful, and have such wonderful characters in them. David Lean is more famous for his huge Technicolor epics, like Lawrence of Arabia, or A Passage to India, but Brief Encounter is his most moving film. It is shot in atmospheric black and white, and tells the story of two people who fall in love, in mundane little England.

Celia Johnston plays Laura, a middle class woman who lives a happy but predictable life, who meets Dr. Alec Harvey, played by craggy Trevor Howard. There starts a doomed love affair, set to the sweeping romantic sounds of Rachmaninov's 2nd piano concerto. This single piece of music plays throughout the film, and stirs up exactly the right emotions. The film will make you want to own a recording of the music.

Such is the power and influence of this film, that it has been remade a few times, and spoofed on countless occasions. It created the archetype for the romantic farewell on a station platform, with steam hissing from trains, and an orchestra playing in the background. Though this has been copied often, it has never been bettered. The film involves a few scenes on railway platforms, and some of these are mundane, others joyous, or despairing, wretched. The director uses many deft tricks to heighten the emotion all along the way. A simple tilt of the camera, or contrasting mood of another character, serves to add tremendous power to the emotion of the scenes.

Times were different then. People were brasher, accents were stronger, and social attitudes to affairs quite different. The period of the film gives it much of its charm. It does not make it a cold study of a different culture, however. The film is very personal. The character of Laura's husband is hardly seen in the entire film, which means that we identify more with Laura's feelings. We see the affair and next to nothing else.

Celia Johnson brings a great deal to the film. She is so likeable, and so able to express the misery that her new love brings her. Her manner of speaking is quite alien to a modern ear. In the 1940s, it was quite normal to add a Y sound to many words. "Hat" became "hyat". The accents are not forced, though - they come across as quite natural, and very likeable.

This film would not be made this way today. The modern audience would demand younger stars, and nudity. See this film to witness how it was once possible to make films about love without bedroom scenes. Brief Encounter is very much stronger for lack of these. Stoicism and restraint are under-rated traits in modern cinema. Modern directors and writers would do well to remind themselves with this film, that a story can be given tremendous emotional power by techniques which seem to have been lost.

Yes, an affair, but really a tribute to committed married love

[roghache · 10/10 · 2 March 2006]

YOU CAN SAFELY READ MY INTRO - NO SPOILERS TO START

I adore this movie, more every time I watch it.

First, just a brief introductory summary to whet your appetite for this great picture (my all time favorite), a vintage black and white film set in Britain during the 1940's... During one of her weekly Thursday shopping excursions in a neighboring town, a rather plain (though earnest and engaging), contentedly married, middle aged housewife named Laura encounters an affable and kind (also married) doctor, Alec, at the train station refreshment counter. Circumstances force a brief interaction and thus begins a series of Thursday meetings between the pair, with casual chance acquaintance quickly replaced by growing and consuming attraction.

Most of the scenes revolve around the station tea shop which serves as a sort of "home base" to the affair. It is Laura's tale; thus the events and emotions are related totally from her point of view, all to the romantic strains of Rachmaninof's Piano Concerto. Read all the other rave reviews about the superb acting / character portrayals, the atmospheric enhancement of the whizzing and hissing trains, and so on. They're all true...plot, character, setting, and atmosphere are all done to perfection in this film.

BEWARE - SPOILERS AHEAD

However, if you want a little serious insight into this movie, consider my unique "take"....

Yes, it's dramatically moving and intense, that farewell touch of Alec's hand on Laura's shoulder. However, I'm probably one of the only viewers who regards this movie as a tribute to married love, as opposed to the middle aged affair between two ordinary people which is its obvious theme. True, the drama revolves around Laura and Alec, their encounters at the train station, their thwarted passions, and their guilt ridden emotions (especially Laura's). But, let's remember, Laura is narrating the tale as she wishes she could tell it to her husband, Fred, obviously her best friend and "the only one who would understand".

Well, isn't a new romance exciting, the more so if forbidden? Champagne lunches, boat excursions out in the countryside, daydreams of Paris and Venice, hanging on each other's every word. Don't we all sort of yearn for it every now and then? However, if Laura and Alec had remained together, before long they would have resembled...Laura and Fred! The Grand Romance seldom lasts, at least not in its original form; it takes on a more meaningful form. (Failure to realize this of course fills modern divorce courts.)

Poor dull Fred! He's my favorite character...I absolutely adore him! He often gets a bad rap from the other reviewers. Don't buy it! Really, there's nothing wrong with him. He probably reminds many a wife of her husband, engrossed with his crossword or whatever. Steady and predictable...the most desirable quality, longterm, in a spouse!

Everyone wonders why the movie shows Laura's husband but not Alec's wife, nor does it give us much information about her, other than the fact that she's "delicate". That's because Brief Encounter is really the story of Laura and FRED. Even though he's not present in that many scenes, his character is well drawn.

Fred may not currently be "sweeping Laura off her feet" but he's actually very kind to her. In the end, he realizes she's been having an affair and is grateful she's chosen him. I categorically disagree with those who claim that Laura returns to her husband only because of society's expectations, not out of love for him.

What happens after the movie closes? Well, maybe Fred pays her a tiny bit more attention and, hopefully, some spark of romance might be rekindled. As for Laura, I think she'll be extremely relieved that her affair WASN'T consummated, occasionally scold herself for her brief period of insanity, realize the depth of Fred's love, and try to make it up to him for her "emotional disloyalty". I doubt Laura will spend too much energy bemoaning what she might have had with Alec; the affair has made clearer to her what she DOES have with Fred.

It's "boring" (?), stable, committed love versus brief romance and passion. No movie portrays the contrast better than Brief Encounter. Pity more people today don't make the choice Laura and Alec did. The world might be a better place.

This movie puts to shame modern cinema where the main characters are generally in bed within the first five minutes. Don't miss it!

I never thought I would appreciate Rachmaninov's music until now

[TheLittleSongbird · 10/10 · 22 February 2009]

I saw this last Christmas, and I was genuinely moved. This movie is so poignant and is a must-see, as it showcases the unique talent of David Lean. Celia Johnson and Trevor Howard as the "ordinary" lovers were perfect together, and Celia Johnson's monologues were so beautifully written, and flawlessly expressed. Also the depiction of the dull husband was very well done. This movie is important to many, because it tells the tale of doomed love, told beautifully here. There were some parts that I thought I was going to cry. Before I saw this movie, I never appreciated Rachmaninov's 2nd piano concerto as much as I do now. The perfect placement of it, was what made the movie what it is today. The music was the best element of this movie, and reminded me of the beautiful Vocalise by the same composer. You will be moved by this! 10/10. Bethany Cox

The most famous romantic film of all time?

[Leofwine_draca · 7/10 · 15 February 2012]

BRIEF ENCOUNTER is very much a product of its age. It's completely alien to somebody brought up on modern cinema. The costumes, photography, acting and script are all products of a bygone age. Yet it still has a special magic that makes it a timeless classic.

In essence, the film's all about a doomed love affair. The movie works through subtlety, both in the subtlety of the performances and in the subtlety of the actors in the roles. Craggy Trevor Howard - not somebody you'd initially think of as a romantic lead - is fine as the ordinary Joe, but it's Celia Johnson who's the film's real delight, creating a character who comes across as one of the most believable women in film.

It's not all perfect. I found myself disliking Laura in places, mainly because of the neglect of her family (and especially children). But overall, BRIEF ENCOUNTER works. It's a film that gets to you, speaks to anybody who's ever been in love and knows what a cruel emotion it is. The cyclical ending is devastatingly perfect, a fine example of how subtlety wins out over bluntness any day of the week.

A simple film with complex emotions

[dj_kennett · 8/10 · 10 October 2000]

Brief Encounter is probably one of the finest romances made by the English film industry. The story line is simple, of a married woman who meets a stranger and falls in love, belies the complexity of the emotions involved. It ends poignantly, as both parties realise that their feelings have been overshadowed by the social impossibility of their situation.

The film is particularly good at reflecting the post-war austerity and morality of England. It may change your view of railway stations forever.

Steam Trains and Rachmaninoff

[JamesHitchcock · 7/10 · 5 April 2012]

Like many film buffs, I am often surprised when a film director wins the "Best Director" award at the Oscars or some other ceremony and yet the film itself is denied "Best Picture". Re-watching "Brief Encounter" recently helped me to understand how such a thing might be possible. There is no doubt that it is a superbly directed film and that David Lean's "Best Director" Oscar nomination was well-deserved. Nevertheless, I have never been convinced by the arguments of those who would claim the film as a great classic of the British cinema.

This was Lean's fourth film, and like his first three ("In Which We Serve", "This Happy Breed" and "Blithe Spirit") was based upon a work by Noël Coward, who adapted the screenplay from his one-act play "Still Life". It tells the story of the relationship (the "brief encounter" of the title) between Laura Jesson, a middle-class housewife, and Alec Harvey, a doctor. The two meet at a railway station while she is returning from a shopping excursion to a nearby town, and arrange to meet again. They quickly become friends and then fall in love. Although their relationship is never consummated (the censors were insistent on this point), they come to care deeply for one another and make plans for a life together. Both, however, are married with two children, and although divorce was legally possible in the Britain of the forties, it was very much frowned upon by social convention. The story is narrated by Laura in the first person, imagining that she is confessing her affair to her husband Fred.

Many people assume that the action takes place in Home Counties suburbia, and certainly the accents (either Received Pronunciation or Cockney) are suggestive of south-east England. Only one character, a policeman who appears briefly, has a northern accent. Other factors, however, do suggest a northern location, notably Alec's reference to coal mines in the vicinity, the initials LMS (London, Midland and Scottish Railway) on the railway carriages and the rugged scenery in the countryside scenes. Finally, the matter is settled when we see references to cities such as Leeds, Bradford and Lancaster on the destination boards on the station platform. (These scenes were actually shot at Carnforth station in Lancashire).

The whole of Coward's play is set in the station refreshment room. Although Lean does open the film up by introducing other settings, such as Laura's home or a cinema, many of the key scenes still take place at the station, and it is in these scenes that Lean shows his gifts as a director to their best advantage. The black-and-white photography of the steam trains is particularly striking and takes on a symbolic quality; constantly in motion, rapidly arriving and departing, they seem to stand for the rapidity of change in human affairs, and in particular the rapidity with which the romance of Laura and Alec develops and then come to an end. These scenes have become even more evocative ever since the steam locomotive ceased to be an everyday means of transport and became a potent symbol of nostalgia.

"Brief Encounter " may have been beautifully photographed, but I was less enthusiastic about either the writing or the acting, both of which are characterised by a deadening emotional reticence which does not sit well with either Lean's dramatic direction or the use on the soundtrack of that supremely romantic piece of music, Sergei Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 2. This is supposed to be the story of an all-consuming, albeit unconsummated, passion, but one would not think so to judge from Coward's script. Coward's greatest gift as a writer was his mordant wit, which he could put to good use in his comedies, but his attempts to write serious drama could often seem artificial and mannered, the sort of drawing-room theatre which in the next decade was to be so angrily rejected by the Angry Young Men.

Nor would one think so from the well-mannered gentility with which Celia Johnson and Trevor Howard mouth their lines. For all their talk of love and desire, I was never convinced that either of them really felt the emotions they were talking about. Even during her lifetime Johnson was regarded as something of a national treasure by an older generation of film-lovers, but I always found her cut-glass accent grating, an early case of Irritating Vowel Syndrome. In this film she sounds more like an aristocrat than any Lancashire housewife (or even London housewife) I have ever heard.

We never see Mrs Harvey, so never learn why Alec was dissatisfied with his existing marriage, but in Laura's case we are supposed to infer that she finds Fred dull, although he is caring and affectionate. Unfortunately, Alec, although idealistic, does not come across as being any more exciting than Cyril Raymond's Fred. Trevor Howard never suggests that if Laura were to leave her husband for him she would be doing any more than exchanging one stolid bourgeois suburbanite for another. (It does not help that, although Howard was only 32 at the time, he looked considerably older). Howard was to give some great performances in films like "The Third Man", but this is not one of them.

One criticism made of the film is that it is "dated", by which is normally meant that attitudes towards sex have changed since the forties. It is certainly true that divorce does not carry the stigma that it did seventy years ago, but there is still a widely held view that adultery is immoral and many modern viewers will still sympathise with Laura and Alec's decision to put their families and their marriages before their love for one another. The problem is that neither Coward, Johnson nor Howard are able to persuade us that this decision really involved any great sacrifice. Lean does his best, but steam trains and Rachmaninoff can only take you so far. 7/10

Celia Johnson terrific

[SnoopyStyle · 8/10 · 15 December 2014]

At a railway station café, housewife Laura Jesson (Celia Johnson) is quietly sitting with doctor Alec Harvey (Trevor Howard). They both have spouses and children. She is flustered when a talkative acquaintance runs into them. It's been only a few weeks ago since she met him at the train station. Their friendship turns into longing and finally obsession.

Celia Johnson gives a haunted look that speaks to her internal conflict. That is the central issue of the movie. She cannot walk that final step. One can argue about her reason but there is no denying Celia's performance. The black and white looks beautiful especially the trains and the station. Director David Lean made a great film.

"Can you really say goodbye and never see me again?"

[classicsoncall · 7/10 · 23 March 2018]

What's striking about this film from a present day perspective is how platonic the relationship between Laura Jesson (Celia Johnson) and Alec Harvey (Trevor Howard) actually was. Made today, the movie would have required the prerequisite hop into bed after the first kiss, but in the 1940's, that would have gotten you into trouble with the Production Code. What I liked about the story was that it featured two ordinary people who weren't glamorous, rich or having any other defining characteristic that might have placed them a notch above average. For moviegoers of the era, that template would have appealed to most at time when people weren't so self absorbed with celebrity and fame. Today, the picture would be a drag as an original release, although for cinema fans there's much here to admire. Director David Lean tells his story with compassion and grace, and though the extramarital affair appears doomed from the start, the fated couple enjoys their moments of fleeting happiness together. What I could have stood less of was the intrusive narration by Celia Johnson's character; my own feeling is that an effective story doesn't need to be translated by one of the characters. And if I didn't know the director of the film was David Lean, I would have guessed Hitchcock, who constantly employed chance meetings, conflicted characters and British ambience, with the railway station setting a natural.

"Whatever your dream was, it wasn't a very happy one, was it?"

[justapilgrim · 5/10 · 23 April 2017]

On the plus side, it was beautifully filmed and Rachmaninoff's music can never be overused - I could listen to it nonstop! The film has much technical merit including insight into middle-class sensibilities and the internal struggle of an ordinary woman to fulfill her family obligations. Unfortunately I found the two main characters, Laura and Alec, overwhelmingly weak and needy! Hard to believe anybody can characterize Alec as virtuous. While he may have the veneer of a good doctor, he was your typical smooth operator, full of himself and likely a serial cheat. Sadly, the way they were more than willing to betray their families made them wholly unlikable: wishy-washy and lacking moral fibre. If anyone in the film stood out, it's the patient and kind spouse, Fred. His compassion and understanding at the very end is the most noble act in this all together tawdry affair. As depressive and dishonest as the wife is, Fred is solid and loyal - proving that he is a better and stronger man. If I was rooting for true love tested, then the ending was perfect.

How Can I Describe Perfection.In Two words:Simply Sublime

[vivian_baum_cabral · 25 May 2003]

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

Fantastic

[gbill-74877 · 9/10 · 20 May 2018]

'Brief Encounter' grabs you from the start, with a chatterbox interrupting a man and a woman who are silently sitting together in the café of a train station, but were clearly in the middle of a conversation before she arrived. When the man (Trevor Howard) eventually departs politely for his train, he presses the shoulder of the woman (Celia Johnson) and slips out through the door. She then takes the train with her friend, who continues to talk incessantly despite her obvious signs of grief. It's at this point that director David Lean first brilliantly utilizes an interior monologue in the mind of the woman. This leads to these fantastic lines:

"This can't last. This misery can't last. I must remember that and try to control myself. Nothing lasts really. Neither happiness nor despair. Not even life lasts very long. There'll come a time in the future when I shan't mind about this anymore, when I can look back and say quite peacefully and cheerfully 'how silly I was'. No, no, I don't want that time to come ever. I want to remember every minute, always, always to the end of my days."

I was hooked from then on, and the film never let up. Based on a play by Noel Coward, it's very well written, and very well executed. The British production has an intelligent, indie feel to it, it's without major stars, and has nothing resembling the fanfare typical of Hollywood movies at the time. Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 2 provides a fantastic score, with dramatic moments, and following the ebb and flow of emotions perfectly.

As you can probably guess, the pair are involved in forbidden love. After returning home to her kind but somewhat boring husband, who takes more interest in crossword puzzles than in her, she recounts the past, starting again with a brilliant bit of us listening in to her thoughts:

"Fred, dear Fred. There's so much that I want to say to you. You're the only one in the world with enough wisdom and gentleness to understand. If only it was somebody else's story and not mine. As it is, you're the only one in the world that I can never tell. Never never. Because even if I waited until we were old, old people and told you then, you'd be bound to look back over the years and be hurt. And my dear, I don't want you to be hurt. You see, we're a happily married couple and let's never forget that. This is my home. You're my husband. And my children are upstairs in bed. I'm a happily married woman - or I was, rather, until a few weeks ago. This is my whole world, and it's enough, or rather, it was until a few weeks ago. But, oh, Fred, I've been so foolish. I've fallen in love. I'm an ordinary woman. I didn't think such violent things could happen to ordinary people."

In telling the story, the film captures what it's like to feel yourself slowly but inexorably drawn to another person, even while knowing it's wrong, feeling guilt, and telling yourself that it can't go on. Those early innocent moments lead to those with the subtlest of sparks, and soon the two are on each other's minds throughout the week, until they might meet again each Thursday. It's honest, and far from tawdry. The pair simply fall in love, and as he puts it, "It's no use pretending that it hasn't happened because it has." It's romantic, and heartbreaking at the same time.

Lean gives us several fantastic scenes on the railway platform. I also loved the one with Johnson running down the street in the rain, and another with the camera twisting to an angle as it slowly zooms in on her face when he's left. The inclusion of the relationship between an older café owner (Joyce Carey) and a night watchman (Stanley Holloway) is playful and fun, and helps provide a counterpoint to the main story. There is a lot to love here, including a powerful ending.

The Original Doomed Love Affair, Beautifully Restored With a Soaring Johnson

[EUyeshima · 9/10 · 20 December 2005]

Long before he made his grand widescreen epics, master director David Lean made small, intimate films about normal people who find themselves outside of their comfort zones. His most famous of these early works - and arguably the gold standard by which all ill-fated love stories are compared - is this 86-minute treasure from 1946. It is the rather simple story of a chance meeting between housewife Laura Jesson and Dr. Alec Harvey in the refreshment room of a suburban London train station. The plot starts innocently enough when Alec removes some smut from Laura's eye, but then they inevitable become drawn to each other and fall in love.

Lean employs a flashback technique to tell the story (penned by Noel Coward along with Lean and Anthony Havelock-Allan) and actually begins with the quiet farewell between Laura and Alec. From there, Laura recalls the entire story, narrating in a breathless and at times frantic voice-over. Watching the events unfold in her memory and listening to her narration, we are drawn completely into her mind as Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto floods the soundtrack. Despite their respective marital statuses, the two begin to fall in love and soon enough, romance and even lust (at least in typically stiff upper-lip British form) have shown up on the scene. After a while, they start to meet on a very regular basis and though both know it will never work, they still spend time together.

Leave it to Lean to transcend the tendency to produce a predictably romantic and masochistic wallow and come up with a more complex set of conflicting emotions. Probably because Laura's narration is so honest and involving, this movie resonates far more than a more Baroque "chick flick" like Irving Rapper's "Now, Voyager" or Jean Negulesco's "Humoresque". Granite-jawed Trevor Howard portrays Alec with sympathy and unapologetic yearning, but it's Celia Johnson who galvanizes the film with a multi-layered performance as she makes Laura's desperation palpable but never off-putting. With her saucer eyes and emotionally pinched demeanor, she truly brings a genuine soul to this vulnerable, emotionally closeted woman who is unable to come to terms with her unconsummated affair. Providing just the right amount of comic relief are Joyce Carey as the haughty refreshment room hostess and Stanley Holloway (well before his ne'er-do-well Alfred Doolittle in "My Fair Lady") as the persistent train station attendant who constantly flirts with her.

Criterion has once again done a superb job in bringing this movie to life as the pristine print really brings out Robert Krasker's crisp cinematography. Film historian Bruce Eder provides informative audio commentary on an alternate track and goes in-depth into not only the production but also the careers of Lean, Coward and all the actors with speaking parts. Beyond that, there is the original trailer and an interesting demonstration of the restoration process. If you have seen Claude Lelouch's "A Man and a Woman" (with Anouk Aimée and Jean-Louis Trintignant) or Ulu Grosbard's "Falling in Love" (with Robert DeNiro and Meryl Streep) or Richard Linklater's "Before Sunrise" (with Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy) or Sofia Coppola's "Lost in Translation" (with Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson)....you owe yourself to see the original inspiration.

Brief Encounter

[Prismark10 · 8/10 · 7 December 2020]

Brief Encounter was written by Noel Coward and directed by David Lean.

The snobbish Coward was gay and Lean had married multiple times during his life. Here was a film made by contrasting personalities.

The movie is all about middle class restraint. It might be to do with the film censorship of the time or not to offend its audience. After all this is a romantic drama about nice people and middle class mores.

Laura Jesson (Celia Johnson) meets Dr Alec Harvey (Trevor Howard) in a cafe at a railway station. She has some grit in her eye and he removes it with his handkerchief.

They then sit and chat to each other. Both are seemingly happily married and have children. When Laura gets up to catch her train, Alec impulsively asks to meet again.

They do meet, have lunch, go to a cinema, walks in the country.

Told in flashback by Laura, her desire and longing for Alec only gets more intense. Enough for them to take risks. A discreet visit to an apartment owned by Alec's friend.

Brief Encounter is a simple movie that is rooted to its time. Lean disguises the simplicity. Laura's and Alec's increasing serious relationship is in contrast with the more comic tone of the station master Albert and the cafe manageress Myrtle. The latter are more working class and flirt rather openly. Laura and Alec try to keep everything discreet.

This is a genteel romantic drama. People talked in clipped tones. It hides a lot of passion underneath and this is highlighted in Laura's narration. There is desperation when their final goodbye is interrupted.

Brief Encounter would not work today. There have been attempts to do something similar. Falling in Love starring Robert De Niro and Meryl Streep had similar themes.

Simple, Honest, and Unforgettable.

[Harold_Robbins · 10/10 · 10 August 2004]

It really pleases me to see the very positive responses here to this gem of a movie. I recently read Kevin Brownlow's epic, detailed biography of David Lean, and I'm less mystified as to how Lean went from intimate character dramas such as this one, and even GREAT EXPECTATIONS and OLIVER TWIST, to the big-screen epics which placed far more emphasis on scenery and very little on character. Lean had great problems with intimacy, and much preferred grandeur (he virtually abandoned his son, and didn't meet one of his grandchildren until she was about 30). I'm not knocking the epics, because I've enjoyed them as well, but at the end of LAWRENCE OF ARABIA one knows about as much about Lawrence as one did about 3-1/2 hours earlier. ..unlike Alec and Laura in this film, whom we know very well after 1-1/2 hours, or Pip and Miss Havisham in EXPECTATIONS, characters who leapt off the screen and endeared themselves to us (it also helped that some really gifted actors & actresses played these roles).

I never tire of BRIEF ENCOUNTER - it's one of the screen's great romances, perhaps because it doesn't quite end "happily ever after". It remains simple, honest, and unforgettable.

a brief triumph

[rebeljenn · 6/10 · 6 October 2005]

Brief Encounter is the story of a forbidden romance, an affair between a married woman and a man who meet at a train station. Their relationship is expressed in detail from the female character's conscious dialog reflecting on the affair, the lovesick girlish way she behaves around the young man (and before meeting him), and in speaking lies to her husband and friends in an attempt to hide the affair. This is an excellent observational film, and it really gets into the psychology of the characters who have the affair. The romance is so forbidden and sweet that it feels like the romance should go on and they should be together, but morals prevail and the couple soon learns that they must part ways. And they do part, in the most memorable fashion, with wonderful pacing that makes one think that they will, indeed, rush back into each other's arms.

Brief Encounter is a wonderful English film which romanticized the train station. A good observation of characters and a detailed look at social history and marriage during the 1940s, Brief Encounter is to be enjoyed and admired as much as it is to be looked at from a historical and moral standpoint.

this is a film very close to perfection by this reviewer's lights, and hopefully yours too

[lasttimeisaw · 9/10 · 15 January 2018]

Irrevocably putting UK maestro David Lean on the international map of a rising future cinematic titan, continuing his auspicious collaborations with famed playwright Noël Coward, BRIEF ENCOUNTER has surmounted itself at the apogee of film romanticism ever since.

Based on Coward's one-act play, it is a garden-variaty extramarital affair between Laura Jesson (Johnson), a middle-class housewife and Alec Harvey (Howard), a married doctor. The film starts in the refreshment tea room of Milford Junction Station, a recurring place where they part ways after their weekly assignations, which also bookends from their first chance meeting to the ultimate farewell, but Lean cunningly leaves them in the periphery of his frame in the opening introduction, the initial perspective is of a gabby interloper Ms. Dolly Messiter (Gregg), an acquaintance of Laura, with whom she shares the same train route. Ms. Messiter's intrusion noticeably throws the pair for a loop, but Alec manages to retain his courtesy until his train arrives, and leaves Laura in an almost catatonic state, even the obtuse Ms. Messiter can tell there is something amiss about her, only if she would know, she has inconveniently obtruded herself into their last goodbye.

After returning to her suburban residence, the voiceover of a distraught Laura begins to enunciate their weekly encounters from stem to stern, at once mundanely amicable and irresistibly intimate. Hence, the story is exclusively told from Laura's viewpoint, and Celia Johnson's extraordinary performance is nonpareil in its acute caliber and immense empathy, it sweeps all over you like a cataract ever since the very first gaze she projects in a close-up, which is so galvanizing that we are rapt in anticipation of its seething undertow's unfolding, and she pampers us with the full treatment, playing out against a cordial and debonair Trevor Howard, who has his own challenge to live up to Johnson's standard in less ample allotment in terms of screen time and backstory, and leaves a sterling impression as an idealist, upstanding, charming man, makes for an emphatically conflicted dyad with Johnson enmeshed in the moral quagmire, and together they elevate the material onto a situationist slant that entirely shucking off their personal liabilities from homily: it can happen to anyone, and when it happens, no one can afford an easy escape, more pertinently, in Laura's imaginative vignettes, Lean's film rams home that this luxury of living one's dreamed life is an everyday illusion that individuality is practically irrelevant, an inevitable temptation those who encounter must cope with wisely, touch wood!

Plumping for Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto as the film's thematic signifier, Mr. Lean also constructs every shot with fluid nicety and supreme lighting in sharpening the focus on its romantic mythos and the characters' torrid inscape, and cleanses any blemish of vulgarity from the seemingly indiscreet situation, this is a film very close to perfection by this reviewer's lights, and hopefully yours too.

Moving and intelligent film about a love affair initiated at a railroad station

[ma-cortes · 7/10 · 3 February 2021]

This is an immortal evergreen classy, an intensely romantic flick concerning a chance meeting at a train station beween a mature and married couple : Trevor Howard is the man , Celia Johnson is the woman, resulting in a sudden but doomed romance . They are two middle-class , middle-aged people become involved in a short romance , as their initial friendship gradually becomes into an intense but bittersweet love that they know has no future.

This is a sensitive and thoughful story of two veteran lonely people married to others . Enjoyable filmmaking results in a memorable , stirring movie for all time . Being well based on Noel Coward's "Still Life" from Tonight at 8:30 and script from Ronald Neame and David Lean himself . Concerning a compassionate look at the innocence of unforeseen, poignant love story . Main actors give very nice interpretation . Celia Johnson is frankly good , as she shows splendidly the agony of her frustrated feelings on her face . And perfect Trevor Howard as the doctor who meets her on his trip to London town . They are deftly supported by a great cast of secondaries , such as : Stanley Holloway , Joyce Carey , Irene Handl , Marjorie Mars, Cryl Raymond , among others .

Adequately and brillianly cinematographed by Robert Krasker, subsequently cameraman in superproductions. Special mention for the excellently photographed scenes on the railway station. And underscored by Rachmaninoff's second Piano Concerto. The motion picture was compellingly directed by David Lean, considered one of the best Brit directors . He made a lot of prestigious and classic movies , such as : "Great expectations, Oliver Twist, Hobson's choice , In which we serve, Summertime , Lawrence of Arabia , The Bridge on the river Kwai , Passage to India , Ryan's Daughter" , among others. Rating : Above average.

Closely watched trains.

[ptb-8 · 8/10 · 31 October 2009]

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.

A small tragedy that hasn't aged much

[tapio_hietamaki · 7/10 · 16 June 2013]

Based on a play, Brief Encounter describes the brief affair of two adults who feel the weight of their responsibilities and struggle between morality and happiness. Focusing mostly on the woman, the film shows her anguish and emotional turmoil in great detail, not leaving much to the imagination.

The film is sad, it's clear from the beginning that the relationship is doomed, but the story is told delicately. They will get over it.

The film is short, but even so, not very concise. It has too much inner monologue that doesn't go anywhere. Actually, nothing in the film goes anywhere, except the trains I guess.

Dated? Obviously, but that's not the reason I don't like it...

[banapaulo · 5/10 · 7 November 2005]

Two reasons I don't like this film: The two main characters are two of the most boring people imaginable: frankly, they deserve each other. Secondly, the dialogue is among the most banal I have ever heard. This has little to do with the time it was made. Didn't they have subtlety in 1945? Implied meaning? Good God woman, you don't have to tell us you sat down, we can see it on the screen. I think the direction is actually very good: excellent use of limited settings, some good lighting and camera angles. But the dialogue. Oh God. "I love you, with all my heart and soul", the good doctor says. "I wish I was dead", Laura sensitively replies. I was in audience with my Film colleagues and we just cracked up. Is this kind of dialogue "quaint" or "British" or "typical of the era it came from" or just plain bad? I'll go with the latter. I don't think there's much problem with the plot really, and I like the way it was told. But Celia Johnson was neither attractive (not her fault) or interesting (her fault) in anyway. She always had a self-pitying look on her face, and this was reflected in her dialogue. As someone else said, she didn't seem to care so much for her family, but more about personal risk in having an affair. Her decision is made for her in the end, which left me feeling that she was lumbered with a family that deserved her more than she deserved them. You know she would of carried on seeing the bloke if she could. So, to summarise, poor acting and poor dialogue. They're usually quite important to a film. David Lean's direction was fine, but I really couldn't give a toss about such silly, selfish and dull characters. The thought that this is considered one of the all-time great tearjerkers is enough to draw one from me, that it's considered one of the best British films ever made is downright depressing.