1001 Club - Brief Encounter (1945)

#183. Brief Encounter (1945)

Why It's In The Book: "The imposing epics of David Lean’s later years sometimes threaten to overshadow the director’s relatively modest early works, but to focus too much on the sheer spectacle of Lawrence of Arabia or Doctor Zhivago,  would be to overlook some of Lean’s greatest accomplishments. After all, only a filmmaker of the highest order could direct Lawrence of Arabia, and that same mastery of the form is on display in Lean’s formative films, albeit on a much smaller scale.

Lean had already directed three adaptations of Noel Coward’s work when he began Brief Encounter, based on Coward’s one-act play Still Life. But the play’s brevity forced Lean to expand the material, and in the process he expanded his own film vocabulary as well… he exploited all the cinematic tools at his disposal; the lighting, for example, approaches the severe look of Lean’s subsequent Dickens adaptations, making the symbolic most of the dark, smoky station. He also makes good use of sound effects (particularly that of a speeding train), as well as music, incorporating Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2 as the film’s running theme."-1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

Member Ratings

TSorensen - 10/10
"I thank you, editors of the Book, for forcing me to watch this movie and promise I will be nicer to you in the future."
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Siochembio - 9.5/10
"Nerts to those who say the restraint dates the film. To me, the restraint is what makes it far more relatable."
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Jay Cluitt - 9/10
"Everyone speaks as though they were born not with just a silver spoon in their mouth, but half the cutlery drawer rammed down their oesophagus."
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Adolytsi - 8/10
"This is a romance drama that works because it doesn’t fall into the trap of melodrama, though some moments may seem it at first glance."
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Movie Guy Steve - 8/10
"Remade today, our twin heroes would be splitting the cost of a cheap motel."
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Nicolas Krizan - 8/10
"A bittersweet love story for grown-ups."
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Squish - 7/10
"It opens like a Film Noir would, thick smoke chuffing up from a steam engine in a hazy train station, a lamp dimly overshadowed by dust and coal."
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Overall Rating: 8.5/10