prs51 I wish to add to the abundance of praise heaped on Mae Clarke in this delightful adaptation of Robert E. Sherwood's play of the sad yet somehow uplifting romance between a young soldier and a demi-mondaine in World War 1. Her wonderful naturalistic performance of the doomed Myra positively glows on the screen and has dated not a whit. One shudders to think what co-star Bette Davis would have done to the role with her mannerisms as she would most likely have been in the part if the film had been made a few years later. A note on the male lead. While lacking the charisma of later Hollywood stars his portrayal of earnest young romanticism does not detract from the film.In hindsight it seems a waste that the 21 year old Mae Clarke could not parlay this exceptional performance into a long and distinguished career like her friend Barbara Stanwyck as this film is clear evidence that the potential was there. The modern age does not do romance at all well unlike this classic from the past and I highly recommend it.

jacobs-greenwood This original version of the Robert Sherwood play is quite different than the more famous MGM remake starring Vivien Leigh and Robert Taylor. The story is more efficiently told, and without flashbacks, such that this film is nearly half an hour shorter.It was directed by James Whale, and the screenplay was written by Benn Levy and Tom Reed. The most notable aspect of this movie is Mae Clarke's terrific performance as the conflicted streetwalker Myra Deauville; Kent Douglass aka Douglass Montgomery is pedestrian as the soldier from a wealthy family she meets, Roy Cronin, who's unaware of her (oldest) profession.Whereas the later film version of the play has Myra and Roy meet and fall in love before she turns to prostitution, as her only means of support, after she's been led to believe that he's died in the war, in this one they meet after the former chorus girl had already been walking the streets for a couple of years, with friend Kitty (Doris Lloyd). Myra meets Roy on the titled London bridge during an air raid while both help an old woman (Rita Carlisle aka Carlyle) to the safety of a shelter. They then spend some innocent time together in her shabby apartment, interrupted by her landlady Mrs. Hobley (Ethel Griffies), who'd earlier asked for Myra's back rent. Naive Roy sees Myra as an out of work chorus girl who's just down on her luck, but she refuses to take advantage of his innocence, is insulted by his offer to pay her bills, and even throws him out, before they reconcile briefly and he leaves on friendlier terms.Roy is only nineteen, and even though he's no longer under the illusion that the war in France is a fun adventure, he's still worlds away from the weary realist that Myra has become. In their brief time together, Roy fell hopelessly in love with Myra and he pursues her with flowers and a new pink dress she'd mentioned in that prior meeting. Neighbor Kitty emboldens Roy's savior complex, and plants the seed that all Myra needs is a (wedding) ring. Later, Roy tricks Myra into visiting his family's estate in the country, where she reluctantly meets his mother Mary (Enid Bennett), sister Janet (Bette Davis), and father-in-law Major Fred Wetherby (Frederick Kerr). Ruth Handforth plays Augusta, their maid. Roy's family welcomes her with open arms but Myra's guilt about "what she is" causes her to tell Mary that she's not really a chorus girl. The next day, it's clear that Mary hasn't told the others what Myra had shared about her life. Finding herself still accepted among Roy's family is too much for Myra and, still feeling unworthy, she flees back to London by train.Myra is conflicted, she tries but can't seem to go back to doing what she always had. Roy returns to Myra's apartment in London, but finds only Mrs. Hobley, who tells him what he didn't know about the woman with whom he'd fallen in love. But still, he searches for her. Myra successfully avoided Roy until she can't help but try to glimpse him as his regiment meets to leave for the front on Waterloo Bridge. He sees her and makes her promise to marry him when he returns. An air raid begins just as the troop truck has driven away, and Myra is killed by a bomb dropped from a German Zeppelin (in lieu of Leigh's suicide) as the film ends, her monogrammed purse and white fox fur lay on the pavement.

preppy-3 This takes place during WW1. Soldier Roy (Kent Douglass) meets and falls in love with Myra (Mae Clarke). She tells him she's a chorus girl but she's actually a prostitute. She falls in love with him too but is racked with guilt over lying to him. It all leads to a predictable (but moving) tragic ending.Excellent drama based on a play. It was remade in 1940 but that version was toned down to appease the Production Code. This version is uncut and (for its time) pretty raw. It was made with top production values and beautifully directed by James Whale. Douglass is very good as Roy (if a little overly naive) but Clarke is excellent as Myra. Her pain and agony comes through in every scene. More surprising is that some members of Roy's family figures out what she does--and could care less. The ending is somewhat predictable but damned if it didn't have me crying. Also is has a young Bette Davis in a supporting role! Recommended.

hasosch James Whale (1889-1957), the once very famous director of most excellent horror pictures such as the original "Frankenstein" (1931), who was later forgotten, after Hollywood forced him, in 1941, to an early retirement due to, amongst other things, non-closeted homosexual liaisons, is recently getting re-detected, having started with the restored edition of Whale's "The Old Dark House" (1932). "Waterloo Bridge" (1931), is his first self-directed feature-long movie. It stands, for all those who know a bit about the difficult life of Whale, closely under the experiences of his early years. The movie has been released for the first time on a film-carrier, having never appeared before on video, due to the self-imposed moral codex of the Hollywood studios and is part of a meritorious series called "Forbidden Hollywood", exclusively never before seen, mostly excellent pictures.Given that "Waterloo Bridge" was made in 1930, compare the acting on the one side with the contemporaneous acting in European movies of the same time - you will find a distance that cannot be bigger, since the over-acting due to the lack of sound which is so characteristic for especially German silent movies, was still sensible for a long time. On the other side, compare the mannerist speaking of the American films noir of the 30ies and 40ies - with both types, "The Waterloo Bridge" has nothing in common. Whale went even so far as to smuggle a few linguistic examples for switching of social codes into the movie - listen carefully the dialogs between the two main actors, the one is a Canadian noble-man turned soldier, the other is a street-walker and former chorus girl. But much more astonishing is not the actual choice of words of different linguistic levels, but the way how extraordinarily open topics are discussed in this movie that would still today be considered improper in many parts of society on both sides of the ocean. Another most interesting sociological feature is that Whale systematically showed the different types of everyday's behavior of a European and a Canadian. The Canadian, very close to the American, is without any reason polite a priori and thus avoiding tough subjects and rather leaves the scene instead of going through to the bloody end. She, the English girl, raises her voice, throws him bucket-wise the stinking truth of her miserable youth in his face - and kind of awakes him in doing so. Compare the scene when Myra admits to her lover's mother that she lives from pick-ups. The mother reacts as if she never had expected such an act of honesty from a girl from her cultural background. What Whale did here is a psycho-gram including not only sociological, but also linguistic behavior.When I was watching this movie, and the movie had nearly reached its end, I said to myself: something is going to happen - otherwise it is not a Whale-movie. And something terrible did happen. Watch this true jewel of highest film work and ask yourself about the function of the bridge.