Brief Encounter (1945)

This early entry in the directorial career of the great David Lean, this was his fourth film, Brief Encounter is interesting to counterpoint in its small scale as Lean became best known for his epics. Based on the 1936 Noël Coward play Still Life, Brief Encounter is the story of an extra martial affair, though one never sexually consummated. Celia Johnson plays Laura Jesson, a mother of two, happily though not excitedly married to Fred Jesson (Cyril Raymond), a good man very found of crossword puzzles. One day on her weekly train outing to the city to do her shopping and catch a movie, Celia runs into hansom doctor Alec Harvey (Trevor Howard) who helps her get a piece of grit out of her eye at the train station. In subsequent weeks the two run into each other on the street, and then share a table at a crowded restaurant, and before long they are seeing each other each Thursday and have fallen in love, though both retrain strong affection for their respective spouses. Theirs is a very unplanned relationship, neither was seeking to cheat, yet it becomes an infatuation they cannot deny and one which each must figure out how to resolve. A very empathetic film it does the best job of any work I can think of in imparting a sense of how an affair can begin so innocently on the part of two very decent people. Understated and beautifully done all around, a just wonderful film. ****