This is, in most ways, a clichéd repeat of 1930s movies about the snobbish English aristocracy and the almost Stepin-Fetchit obsequiousness of the English peasantry. Think *Mrs. Miniver* from two years before, or *Rebecca* from four years before. Irene Dunne gives yet another wonderful, nuanced performance, and Alan Marshal, handsome but not a great actor, is dispensed with fairly early in the movie, so we can enjoy Gladys Cooper and the other character roles instead.
But then, at the end, we several times are told that "God will never forgive us if we break faith with our dead again," if we go to war yet again after World Wars I and II, with all their loss of life. It is a very strange note on which to end this movie, especially since, when it was released in June, 1944, we were just landing in Normandy and had no idea when World War II would end, and how.
This is, in short, about as close to an anti-war movie as the Office of War Information could have countenanced during the war.
As I said at the beginning, most of it is just Hollywood clichés about the English recycled. Nothing new.
But the end, far from uplifting, is particularly somber.
I recommend it for Dunne's fine performance, and for the hint at isolationism that the end seems to suggest.
But then, at the end, we several times are told that "God will never forgive us if we break faith with our dead again," if we go to war yet again after World Wars I and II, with all their loss of life. It is a very strange note on which to end this movie, especially since, when it was released in June, 1944, we were just landing in Normandy and had no idea when World War II would end, and how.
This is, in short, about as close to an anti-war movie as the Office of War Information could have countenanced during the war.
As I said at the beginning, most of it is just Hollywood clichés about the English recycled. Nothing new.
But the end, far from uplifting, is particularly somber.
I recommend it for Dunne's fine performance, and for the hint at isolationism that the end seems to suggest.