MGM
Directed by H.C. Potter
My rating: 3.5 stars out of 4
IMDb
(Turner Classic Movies)
The war is over and the family from Mrs. Miniver is reunited in London. It begins appropriately enough on VE Day, with all of London celebrating. However, Mrs. Miniver, again played to perfection by Greer Garson, is shown going into a doctor's office. An unexplained illness throws a pallor over the return of her husband and daughter. Later, we learn she only has months to live. She keeps the diagnosis to herself while dealing with the love life of her daughter and the career of her husband. The shadow of the just-ended war hangs over the entire movie. At one point she says everyone had to be tough during the war, but she "just wasn't tough enough". Her daughter's romance, sparked during wartime, is struggling to survive at home. Her husband wants to leave the country all together, the view from his office window dominated by a crumbling building. These themes are delicately woven together with her story. The final scenes could have been heartbreaking, but are handled with a poetic dignity. The camera can't bear to watch as she breaks the news to her husband, instead filming the scene in reflected water. The final image we have of Mrs. Miniver is her ascending the stairs, then disappearing in shadows. Vastly underrated.
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