Tyrone Power & Joan Fontaine in "This Above All" (1942)
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- čas přidán 14. 10. 2024
- In England, during early days of the Second World War, Prudence Cathaway (Joan Fontaine), daughter of the aristocratic General Cathaway (Henry Stephenson), announces to her snobbish family that she has joined the Women's Auxiliary Force. When the Cathaways balk at her decision, Prudence lectures them on their outdated values.
At the WAAF training camp, Prudence befriends Violet Worthing (Queenie Leonard), who soon fixes her up with Clive Briggs (Tyrone Power), an army friend of Violet's sweetheart, Joe (John Abbott). Unaware that Prudence is from aristocracy, Clive declares his distaste for all of England's upper class, but Prudence falls in love with him anyway. As their romance flourishes, Clive and Prudence go on their first military leave together, taking a seven-day vacation at the Dover Grand Hotel.
In Dover, Prudence runs into her Aunt Iris Cathaway (Gladys Cooper), but the two merely exchange unfriendly glances. Fearing that her aunt will tell her family about her affair with Clive and that she will be further ostracized by them, Prudence becomes distraught. Clive, too, begins to act strangely, yelling military orders in his sleep and becoming generally distracted.
Later, when Prudence reads the telegram that seemed to trigger Clive's unusual behavior, she learns only that his friend Monty (Thomas Mitchell) is coming to visit him. Prudence later learns that Clive deserted the army after being wounded at Dunkerque, and that Monty has come to return Clive to his regiment before he is officially listed as a deserter. Clive eventually confides in Prudence that he left the service because he disliked defending England's aristocracy. Prudence responds by giving Clive an impassioned lecture about the glory of England. Her speech brings tears to her eyes and drives Clive away.
Clive sets out on foot but does not get far before a farmer (Billy Bevan), mistaking him for a spy, assaults him. The bloodied Clive takes refuge at a nurse's home, but the nurse learns that he is a suspected spy and threatens to call the police. Clive then seeks help from a Vicar (Thomas Louden), who lectures Clive on faith and inspires him to return to his regiment.
Before turning himself in, however, Clive sends Prudence a message to meet him at Charing Cross so that they can be married. On his way to Charing Cross, though, Clive is arrested by military police and taken to headquarters. After pleading with his commander, Clive manages to secure a two-hour leave so that he can meet Prudence one last time. Clive's second attempt to get to Charing Cross in time to meet Prudence is stymied when he is wounded while rescuing a woman and her child from a burning building. Clive is rushed to a hospital, and as his life hangs in the balance, Prudence arranges an impromptu wedding. At Clive's bedside, a nurse, reading from Shakespeare's play Hamlet , says, "This above all: To thine own self be true," after which an air raid siren is heard and darkness descends on the room.
A 1942 American Black & White romance film directed by Anatole Litvak, produced by Darryl F. Zanuck, screenplay by R. C. Sherriff, adapted from Eric Knight's 1941 novel of the same name, cinematography by Arthur Miller, starring Tyrone Power, Joan Fontaine, Thomas Mitchell, Henry Stephenson, Nigel Bruce, Gladys Cooper, Philip Merivale, Sara Allgood, Alexander Knox, Queenie Leonard, Melville Cooper, Jill Esmond, Holmes Herbert, Denis Green, Arthur Shields, Dennis Hoey, Thomas Louden, Miles Mander, and Mary Field. Final screen appearance of Mrs. Wilfrid North.
Appearing in this film are no fewer than twenty performers who appeared in at least one of the Sherlock Holmes movies with Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce, the latter playing Ramsbottom.
Clive (né Vivian) James chose his name from this character.
The title comes from the famous line in William Shakespeare's "Hamlet," Act I, Scene III: "This above all, to thine own self be true."
Winner of the 15th ACADEMY AWARDS | 1943, Academy Award for Best Art Direction (Black-and-White). Art Direction: Richard Day, Joseph Wright; Interior Decoration: Thomas Little. It was nominated in several other categories, and was the only non-Best Picture Oscar nominee that year to be nominated for Best Editing.
"Lux Radio Theater" broadcast a 60-minute radio adaptation of the movie on September 14, 1942, with Tyrone Power reprising his film role.
Soundtrack music:
"Loch Lomond" - Traditional
"Smiles" - Music by Lee S. Roberts
"Old Soldiers Never Die" - Traditional
"Keep the Home Fires Burning" - Music By Ivor Novello, Lyrics by Lena Guilbert Ford
The New York Times, described Anatole Litvak's engrossing romantic drama as "a taut and poignant war film" and "a very moving love story with a sensitive regard for tensile passions against a background of England at war".
Fontaine's radiant performance and Power's handsomeness make a fine romantic pairing, and this rises above propaganda to be enduring sweet and romantic entertainment.
My English mother, June Edith Neal Marston Harris, joined the WAAFs in 1941 at age 16 after graduating with high honors from a private girls' school in Brokenhurst, England. Her mother was very unhappy about this but her father was supportive and signed for her. By the next year, age 17, she made Corporal. And the next year at age 18 she met my American Sailor father at a military dance in Cardiff, Wales. And at age 19 she married him in a 12th century Anglo-Saxon church, Eling St. Mary's, in her village of Totton. Mother was in the first crossing of GI War Brides in Feb. 1946 to NYC on the RMS Queen Mary which was still painted battleship gray from transporting US troops to England
How very awesome
Excellent story, thanks for sharing!
My mum was a little child during the bombing of England. She got moved out of London in The Evacuation with most of the other kids, but never forgot the bombing.
@@cattymajiv
Yes, that sort of
experience stays
with you...
I know someone
whose family were
"bombed out "and
at age 87, she is still
" haunted " by the
trauma of the war...
🇬🇧🦉🤔🌈😢🦉🇬🇧
Traductor español
Fabulous, simply fabulous. Sobering to think this was made during the war it was set in.
Yes. And fascinating too, in some ways ...
Perhaps I am being sensitive as age advance, the very end of this movie just quite touching make me cry somehow, thank you very much for the movie. They don't make movie like this anymore. Once again thanks.
I ran out of hankies. What a find!
They make plenty of good movies now, and I'm sick of comments that claim they don't. Just because you didn't see them doesn't mean they don't exist.
I'm 72, and here is another gem that I have never seen. What a wonderful wartime film, dealing with so many profound subjects, from patriotism to social culture, to love and class barriers, reason and faith, and even Shakespeare! And so many wonderful character actors! Thank you for finding this film and uploading it! SUB SCRIBED
Fontaine and Power worked well together. Joan was a class act. The entire cast was well chosen. Sets were very realistic for having been filmed in the USA..Very enjoyable Thank you..
BOTH Tyrone Power and Joan Fontaine are exceptional in their performances, and possibly the most aesthetically beautiful couple in cinematic history, here.
...as were Laurence Olivier & Merle Oberon in "Wuthering Heights", that is, another aesthetically beautiful couple in cinematic history.
I joined the Women's Army Corps in 1966. My parents did not want me to join. People had low opinions of women being in the military back then (some still do). I did not have as much freedom as Joan Fontaine's charter had in this movie. Women in the Army had to travel in groups of three (or more) back then. We were never allowed to go out alone after dark.
all smart people know that it is evil to have w serve in mil
Thank you for your service.
All smart people know that women make up 50% of the population, and therefore, it's great to have their help.
❤❤❤ thank you, I was born in 1966
Isn't that ironic given the difference in crime rates compared to 2024! You'd think it would be the opposite.
Oh my goodness, what a good story! I enjoyed this very much. Thank you for showing it.
Good movie; a beautiful love story featuring 2 of my favorite actors, the very handsome Tyrone Power & lovely Joan Fontaine. Thanks for sharing!
A grand movie from a very difficult time.
Nicely put 👍🏻🇬🇧
The British deserve so much credit for their strength in adversity and courage, just like the Ukrainians do today. I nearly burst into tears at the grocery store last week, when the cashier told me he was a refugee from Ukraine.
SLAVA UKRAINI ! ! ! 🇺🇦 🇺🇦 🇺🇦
Nice movie first time watching this with the lovely Joan Fontaine Tyrone Power played his part well also the great Thomas Mitchell was as good as ever
Thanks for liking my comment
My first time seeing this: these war movies make me think of my father...
Me too.
Joan Fontaine is a great, beautiful actress.
Excellent movie. I love Joan Fountain and Tyrone Powers.
Glad you like it. Welcome.
When you watch these wonderfully old films, badly the smoking is depressing because so actors died fromit. My mother smoked for60 years and she suffered!
Sad this fine actor and man died at 44 and I'm still going on at 83!
robertwilkins8357, according to bio i read of him, you probably led a cleaner life than him.
@@saraswatkin9226 how kind thank you.
Such a great movie 😢 !!!!!
Not seen this movie yet.But due to good starcast,director,composer n photographer it tempts me watch.
A good film, worth watching
Wonderful movie.
Anguished through whole movie afraid for Cleve.....bless ALL the Men HEROES everyone.& the women did their part ......good ending..🎚️
A magnicent performance by Joan
Fontaine. She is always too good to o be true.
Love it!!!
An impossibly beautiful military couple go on leave, check into a hotel and ask for... separate rooms? Um...okay. And it took me half an hour to figure out that Tyrone Power was playing a Brit, not an American! Never mind. This is a luminous, old school Hollywood World War II romance, buoyed by a truly gobsmacking twist. Joan Fontaine, who epitomized vulnerability in Hitchcock's Rebecca and Suspicion, adds backbone and gives two great barn-burning speeches; Power, who'd been fighting for roles with more depth, lays the groundwork for his truly astonishing work in the original Nightmare Alley (the best American film of 1947). Like Mrs Miniver, also released in 1942, this is a powerful portrait of the British role in beating the Nazis; unlike that Oscar winner, which venerated their way of life to the point of near-worship, this questions aspects of it but still argues that it's worth fighting for. That may make this one an even more effective wartime statement. 8/10.
As a female Marine, I've always admired the way Women worked during the War. If the haughty Germans hadn't bragged they didn't need THEIR women doing men's work, and their women had worked like the English, US and Russians did, who knows how much harder they would have been to defeat? Lovely old movie, with Joan giving a long-winded, gushing speech about what England 'is'. She and Tyrone surely made a beautiful couple. TY for this post!
THOMAS MITCHELL! ❤
THOMAS MITCHELL! 😊
THOMAS MITCHELL!❤
13 July, 2024.
There is an advert
during this film for
a current production
of Noel Coward's
" Present Laughter".
I'm sure it will be
enjoyable to see,
but may I heartily
recommend the one
starring
Donald Sinden ,
here on CZcams,
I found it very well done,
and so funny.😊
The characters were
all well portrayed, in
a lovely set. 😊.
Look at the painted door :
a view of the sea, etc.
Enjoy ! 😊
🇬🇧😊📖💙🌈📽️🦉🇬🇧
My mother was in the wraaf
Based at stanmore and biggin
Hill was on the plotting tables
During battle of britain!
8:48 " You ain't a Blue Stockng?" noun: blue-stocking
an intellectual or literary woman.
Some scenes are so dark its impossible to see..😮
Thomas Mitchell superb as always.
SPOILER Question: Does that dreadfully handsome man recover or not????
SPOILER Answer: Unclear.
❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤
En español por favor!!!
Dear Prudence, won’t you come out to play?
❤😊
1:05:35 What a beautiful speech! But what of England now? England is on fire. God save the West!
💚🙏😇🙏💚
Joan Fontaine is the half-sister of Olivia De Havilland , different Fathers .
😊
Sappy. Music too maudlin.
Excuse my ignorance vis a vis older English idioms, but does “blue stocking” mean lesbian? At 9:00 in the woman asks Joan Fontaine (when she didn’t want to go to the dance): “You’re not a blue stocking, are you?” And she responds “Absolutely not.”
Sorry, shall enjoy the rest of the film now but was curious …
Wonderful film. Joan Fontaine was a transcendent beauty and actor. Perhaps didn’t have the eyes of her sister, but everything else and then some.
No. It refers to snooty "high" society.
I think it refers to a group of women in Bloomsbury UK, who were interested in intellectual subjects. They often wore rather thick lisle wool stockings coloured blue. The most derisory opinion of them could not manage more than an attack on their stockings. The women were generally upper class, well bred, educated and able in answering their detractors. They tended to be forerunners for the women’s movements seeking rights and votes. They were a resilient breed! I am grateful they attempted to awaken society to the value of women from all walks of life. The groundwork was laid long before World War One after which the UK recognised the services of women by granting them the vote.
Bookworms. Lesbians are something else. 😂
@@doreekaplan2589 No different from today, women interested in intellectual subjects are not 'snooty' or confined to 'high' society. Nor are they relegated to gay, heterosexual or bisexual identification.
@@redtobertshateshandles Intellectuals.
Tyrone was a pretty handsome guy.
Not in Errols league, but I suppose that we can't all be Irish.
Maybe Tyrone wasn't a bastard. 😂
Pee wee Herman beats both of them.
@@jaengen Pee Wee only beat himself. In a dark theatre.
Maybe @redtobertshateshandles is exactly what he claims Powers wasn't. As if anyone gives a sh*t about the martial status of people anymore. There are few things as unimportant as that peice of paper.
@@puttentanesame6687 You don't really think we care do you? Or maybe we should ask why do YOU care? Are you fixated on that?
TYRONE POWER a good actor i like him but this film has too much narrative for me...T Y anyway.
Not often a post blatantly declares lack of cognitive thought like you just did.
@@puttentanesame6687 👋❤️
@@puttentanesame6687 Yes. I've never even heard anyone complain about "too much narrative" before.
😊