Waterloo Bridge (1931)

User Rating:

7.5/10   

Director:

James Whale

Writers:

Benn W. Levy (writer)
Tom Reed (writer)

Release Date:

1 September 1931 (USA)

Genre:

Drama | War

Plot:

In World War I London, Myra is an American out of work chorus girl making ends meet by picking up men on Waterloo Bridge...

Plot Keywords:

London England | Canada | Prostitution | Bombing | Chorus Girl

Cast

Mae Clarke	...	Myra Deauville
Douglass Montgomery	...	Roy Cronin (as Kent Douglass)
Doris Lloyd	...	Kitty
Frederick Kerr	...	Major Fred Wetherby
Enid Bennett	...	Mrs. Mary Cronin Wetherby
Bette Davis	...	Janet Cronin
Ethel Griffies	...	Mrs. Hobley, Landlady
Rita Carlyle	...	The Old Woman (as Rita Carlisle)
Ruth Handforth	...	Augusta, the Maid

Runtime:

81 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.20 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Sound System)

Filming Locations:

Pasadena, California, USA

Company:

Universal Pictures

Movie Connections:

Referenced in The Frankenstein Files: How Hollywood Made a Monster (1999) (V)

Soundtrack:

God Save the King

Mae Clarke Steals the Show

Really excellent pre-code film, set in wartime London where an ex-chorus girl/current street walker (played by Mae Clarke) heads over to Waterloo Bridge to try and find herself a soldier on leave, and she meets wealthy, baby-faced, nineteen-year-old raw/green Roy and invites him up to her flat. He immediately falls in love and thinks she's a "good girl", unaware of her real walk of life. She falls for him too, but keeps putting him off, racked with guilt over her secret "career". Meanwhile he keeps pressing on, sneaking in her window, tricking her into meeting his family for a weekend of tennis, tea, and cocktails, asking her to marry him, etc. - he's completely smitten!

Top-notch acting and a good deal of chemistry between the two leads helps make this a really interesting, absorbing film. Their conversations together come across as quite realistic, and the performance given here by Mae Clarke is amazing - extremely well-done and memorable. I also enjoyed seeing a very young Bette Davis who appears here in a very small role as Roy's sister. Only one thing that bothered me about this film is, why oh why, as I have often seen done in period films made during this time, do they have the actresses appearing in modern, early 30s dresses, rather than period costume? Oh well, still a really first-rate film, well worth seeing.