Noel Coward said Jane Bryan was one of the best actresses on the planet after seeing "We Are Not Alone," from 1939. This beautiful woman led a charmed life. After making two more films, she married the owner of Rexall Drugs and retired. I'd say she did okay.
"We Are Not Alone" is based on the novel by James Hilton and stars, besides Bryan, Paul Muni, Flora Robson, and Una O'Connor. I didn't read the novel, so I'm unclear whether it was a love story or a story making an antiwar statement, or managed to do both things in a less choppy manner than the film. In any case, the film, set in England at the start of World War I, does a complete turnaround midstream and becomes about something else.
Muni plays an absent-minded, sweet, respected doctor, David Newcombe, who lives in a village with his wife Jessica (Robson) and young son Gerald. Gerald is overimaginative, easily frightened, and his mother's response is to be too harsh and disciplinary. Fortunately, he has his father to balance things out.
David encounters Leni (Bryan) when she becomes his patient. She's Austrian and is a dancer, but when she becomes injured, her work becomes too difficult. At one point, he brings Gerald with him when he treats her, and, hearing about how good she is with the boy, Jessica thinks she might be a great nanny. She hires her.
It's not long before gossip starts, and Jessica becomes jealous and also doesn't like the fact that Leni was "on stage" and at one point attempted suicide. She and David argue, with David refusing to fire Leni. Jessica angrily brings the boy to live with her brother.
When the town erupts in anti-German sentiment, David realizes that he has to get Leni out of the country immediately.
This is a disappointing film, to say the least - I mean, what happened to the Hayes code? The Hayes code wanted everybody punished for their sins, so how come people are punished when they don't commit any? I really had a major problem with this.
Una O'Connor as the troublemaking maid is a shrew right out of hell. The little boy, played by David Severn, is adorable, and his innocent smile at the end of the film will make you cry. Someone wrote that the end is life-affirming. In a way, I guess it is. Still, it bothered me.
So much for wanting to end Thanksgiving on an upbeat note.
"We Are Not Alone" is based on the novel by James Hilton and stars, besides Bryan, Paul Muni, Flora Robson, and Una O'Connor. I didn't read the novel, so I'm unclear whether it was a love story or a story making an antiwar statement, or managed to do both things in a less choppy manner than the film. In any case, the film, set in England at the start of World War I, does a complete turnaround midstream and becomes about something else.
Muni plays an absent-minded, sweet, respected doctor, David Newcombe, who lives in a village with his wife Jessica (Robson) and young son Gerald. Gerald is overimaginative, easily frightened, and his mother's response is to be too harsh and disciplinary. Fortunately, he has his father to balance things out.
David encounters Leni (Bryan) when she becomes his patient. She's Austrian and is a dancer, but when she becomes injured, her work becomes too difficult. At one point, he brings Gerald with him when he treats her, and, hearing about how good she is with the boy, Jessica thinks she might be a great nanny. She hires her.
It's not long before gossip starts, and Jessica becomes jealous and also doesn't like the fact that Leni was "on stage" and at one point attempted suicide. She and David argue, with David refusing to fire Leni. Jessica angrily brings the boy to live with her brother.
When the town erupts in anti-German sentiment, David realizes that he has to get Leni out of the country immediately.
This is a disappointing film, to say the least - I mean, what happened to the Hayes code? The Hayes code wanted everybody punished for their sins, so how come people are punished when they don't commit any? I really had a major problem with this.
Una O'Connor as the troublemaking maid is a shrew right out of hell. The little boy, played by David Severn, is adorable, and his innocent smile at the end of the film will make you cry. Someone wrote that the end is life-affirming. In a way, I guess it is. Still, it bothered me.
So much for wanting to end Thanksgiving on an upbeat note.