Brief Encounter

Celia Johnson - Laura Jesson
Trevor Howard - Dr. Alec Harvey
Cyril Raymond - Fred Jesson
Joyce Carey - Myrtle Bagot
Stanley Holloway - Albert Godby
Valentine Dyall - Stephen Lynn
Everley Gregg - Dolly Messiter
Margaret Barton - Beryl Walters
Dennis Harkin - Stanley
Marjorie Mars - Mary Norton
Nuna Davey - Mrs. Rolandson
George V. Sheldon - Clergyman
Jack May - Boatman
Edward - Hodge Bill
Wilfred Babbage Policeman
Henrietta Vincent - Margaret
Irene Handl - Organist

Brief Encounter was David Lean's first major success both in popular and critical terms. It was also the first venture into a thematic vein which Lean would mine repeatedly in future. The source of Brief Encounter was Noel Coward's 1935 play Still Life, and the first step of the adaptors (Lean, Neame, Havelock-Allan, and Coward himself) was towards opening the play up. In keeping with Lean's considerable drive to enlarge outwardly and escape the studio, the script now spread beyond the railroad station tea room, which contained almost all the action of the original, to the train platform, the city streets, restaurants, theatre’s, woods, park gardens, and even drives through a picturesque countryside.

Brief Encounter is a classic romantic drama set in 1945 during WWII in and around the fictional Milford railway station. A married women; Laura (Celia Johnson) meets a Doctor (Trevor Howard) in the stations waiting room, the Doctor kindly removes a piece of grit from her eye then leaves to catch his train. During her following shopping trips to Milford, Laura meets Alec again and a friendship begins to develop, soon the meetings become a fixed arrangement.

As their relationship grows both Alec and Laura find themselves drawn to each other, falling in love, they begin to regularly attend the cinema together and visit the surrounding area during their short spells of time together – then finally they exchange kisses at the railway station to confirm their feelings. Yet Laura is both uncomfortable and elated, excited by the attention of a loving man but guilty about being unfaithful to her passionless husband Fred (Cyril Raymond). Laura continues the deception and embarks on a passionate extramarital affair - after much hesitation she gives in to Alec’s plea’s and joins him at a his friends Stephen’s apartment, but Stephen returns unexpectedly to his flat and a guilt-ridden Laura runs away. Alec later catches up with her and breaks the news that he is soon to leave the country after receiving a job offer from his brother in South Africa -he asks that she meets him next week for a final rendezvous. They meet the following Thursday and enjoy a day in the country, a romantic final visit to the tea room – before Laura finally says a last goodbye to Alec as his train departs from the railway station.