I have asked certain users on Spout to recommend a movie to me. I will be blogging about these films as I watch them. This film was recommended to me by joem18b
Brief Encounter
The next David Lean film I was planning on seeing was Great Expectations, because I loved his adaptation of Oliver Twist so much, I thought checking out his other Dickens adaptation would be a good idea. But then joem18b (who I sometimes call Joe but have never actually confirmed that is his real name) recommended to me Brief Encounter.
They say on the special features of this DVD that this is the ultimate classic women's movie. What might now be referred to as the genre of "chick flick". Why is it the ultimate? Because apparently most men also like it as much as women.
Now I personally am often put off right away in a film when characters who are supposed to be sympathetic start getting caught up in an affair. I guess the point of this one is that you can see how unexpectedly something like that can start. Neither of them were planning to have an affair. At least we know that with the woman Laura. We know because David Lean expanded the original play by Noel Coward into a film by adding several scenes of Laura at home and with her husband and children. This means everything is looked at from her point of view. We never see the man Alec apart from Laura (except for one strange scene with him and his friend/coworker). Sometimes I felt like Alec was being a bit pushy and wondered if he might be lying about some things. I don't think the intention of the filmmaker was for him to be lying, but it would have been nice to see what he was like with his own wife and at his own home as well. However I may be argueing against the thing that really makes this movie work. The subjective point of view experience we get through Laura is probably what makes this the ultimate women's film and also what established David Lean as a strong independent personality in the world of filmmaking.
David Lean:
Total feature length films seen: 3
Previous average film score: 7
New average film score: 7.3333
Rating: 8/10