I love a good tragic romance. This was one of the very early films David Lean made as director (he came up the ranks as an editor) and it's one of his best. The plot is simple: two married thirty-somethings meet, feel a mutual attraction, and struggle to maintain control and not betray their spouses. The backstory behind the success of this movie is really interesting: it touched a nerve with local middle-class audiences because they saw the middle class as the moral compass of England and they could relate to the character's feeling stuck in polite but passionless marriages. The story is framed as a flashback: the film begins with the main characters' final meeting and then backtracks to explain the stinging goodbye.
A masterclass in restraint all around. I like that it keeps the focus on the two main characters and doesn't waste time with subplots. There are only a few supporting characters, and one of them is the lovable Stanley Holloway, best known for playing Alfie Doolittle in My Fair Lady. Like all of Lean's films, it has great cinematography. The use of Rachmaninov's piano concerto (used for comedic affect a few years later in The Seven Year Itch) is a nice touch.
Watch this movie!
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