Bitter Sweet
The first film adaptation, and most faithful, of Noel Coward's 1929 operetta Bitter Sweet. This tells the story of Sarah Linden's romance, the tale begins with Sarah, now older, reminiscing about her first love. As a young girl Sarah falls in love with Carl, a musician, and runs off with him to Vienna. They are happily wed and Carl earns a living conducting a small orchestra. Enter a certain Captain who sets his eye on Sarah and proceeds to shower her with his attentions, much to her dismay.
Details
Release Date: 8/21/1933
Runtime: 93 minutes
Languages: English
Director: Herbert Wilcox
00Production
Companies: British & Dominions Film Corporation, Herbert Wilcox Productions
Countries: United Kingdom
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Reviews
CinemaSerf
Noël Coward and Herbert Wilcox have combined here to create an engaging little musical romance with a couple of memorable songs and a gently bubbling screenplay. Told by way of a retrospective, Anna Neagle is "Sarah" who marries the penniless musician "Carl" (Fernand Gravey) and heads to Venice where they eke out a meagre living until he is offered a job conducting a small orchestra and she sings along. Her talents manage to attract the unwanted attentions of "Capt. Lutte" (Miles Mander) and very shortly afterwards, things take a tragic turn. It's got something of the silent movie about it - there are extended scenes with no dialogue, and both Neagle and Mander offer us a degree of gesturing that wouldn't have looked out of place ten years earlier. At times this does hold the pace back but we also have Ivy St. Helier's sultry "Manon la Crevette" who delivers "If Love Were All" and Neagle is quite robust singing "I'll See You Again". It was remade with more money and colour, but I'm not sure it needed either. This is quite an entertaining 90 minutes.
