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Waterloo Bridge (1940)
In director Mervyn Leroy's classic, sentimental, romantic
tearjerker - Vivien Leigh's first film following her success in Gone
With The Wind (1939):
- at the start of WWII in the opening sequence - setting
up a flashback, middle-aged British General Roy Cronin (Robert
Taylor) stood mid-span on the Waterloo Bridge in London after emerging
from a limousine; he was again readied to be deployed to the war
front in France; as he stood on the bridge and pulled out of his
coat a keepsake and symbol of a long-lost love of his life, he
reminisced about the same setting years earlier in 1914 when he
was a handsome young Army captain - ready to depart for the trenches
in World War I; the object was a small ceramic, good-luck charm-doll
(or billiken); he remembered during an air raid how he had retrieved
the dropped purse and lucky charm of 19 year-old Myra Lester (Vivien
Leigh), a naive and virginal ballet dancer, and helped her to an
underground station shelter; as they parted after an all-clear
was announced, she gave him her good-luck charm
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Opening Sequence: Before General Roy Cronin's Flashback
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- in the film's most romantic sequence, after attending
Myra's evening ballet performance (and missing an invitation to a
Colonel's dinner), WWI Army Capt. Roy Cronin met with Myra for dinner
and waltzed with her in candlelight in the Candlelight Club to the
tune of "Auld Lang Syne" as groups of musicians extinguished
their lights - and they experienced their first kiss, when they parted
at about 4 am, he requested: "Please leave me first..." as
he went off to war
- however, his departure was delayed by two days and
he and Myra met again the next late morning, when he impetuously
insisted on marrying Myra: ("Now, listen, darling. None of your
quibbling. None of your questioning. None of your doubts. This is
positive, you see. This is affirmative, you see. This is final, you
see. You're going to marry me, you see!"); he went to receive
proper permissions from his military superiors, including
Roy's wealthy uncle the Duke (C. Aubrey Smith) who reluctantly agreed
to Roy's proposed marriage to Myra, although she was of a lower class
- after they bought a ring and flowers, they went to
St. Matthew's Church, where he affirmed: "I was never so sure
of anything in my life. The moment you left me after the air raid,
I knew that I must find you again, quickly. I found you and I'll
never let you go"; however, they had to postpone the marriage
until 11 am the next day - but then again shortly later that evening,
Capt. Roy's orders were changed and he phoned Myra, informing her
that he was leaving from Waterloo Station in 25 minutes; Myra arrived
at the station and was only able to wave goodbye to Roy as his train
departed
- Myra had missed her evening performance in order to
be with him and as a result was dismissed from her job by Madame
Olga Kirowa (Maria Ouspenskaya), the tyrannical mistress of the troupe
in an international ballet school; when her best friend/roommate
Kitty (Virginia Field) stood up for Myra: ("I'm sick of you
and your tyranny. You treat us like a lot of slaves and call it discipline"),
she also lost her position; Myra
and Kitty both found themselves unemployed and quickly growing penniless:
("We can't get jobs
in a show, we can't get them anywhere else")
- during Roy's deployment, Myra was scheduled one afternoon
to be introduced to Roy's rich, socially-conscious, aristocratic
mother Lady Margaret Cronin (Lucile Watson) in a tea room; while
waiting, Myra noticed Roy's name on a casualty list of
"FALLEN OFFICERS" in a newspaper - and she fainted; sickened
by the thought and drinking brandy, she avoided telling Lady Margaret,
who arrived a half hour late, the distressing news and thereby offended
his mother with her strange, stand-offish and incoherent behavior;
she left abruptly with a cold goodbye: ("Forgive me, my dear,
but are you quite well?...Myra, I want you to remember that I tried
to be your friend. I've come because Roy wanted me to come and because
I wished to. Perhaps we'll try again someday")
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Myra's Discovery of Roy on a Newspaper Casualty
List of 'Fallen Officers'
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- afterwards, Myra was grief-stricken and fell ill believing
that Roy had been killed in battle; Kitty had secretly turned to
prostitution to pay for their food expenses and medical care for
Myra, while excusing her loose behavior: ("What difference does
it make as long as we live?") with men "who wanna kill
a few hours because they know it may be their last"; soon after,
the heartbroken and desperate Myra joined Kitty and also became a
street-walker and was soon picking up male clients on the Waterloo
Bridge
- a year later at the London train station, Myra was
shocked by the appearance of the returning Captain (who was not dead
after all); he had only been injured with a head wound and became
a German prison-camp POW; during the unexpected reunion, the guilt-ridden
Myra - who accidentally met him while she was soliciting
business from returning soldiers, pretended that she was there
to greet a friend; she was overwhelmed by his warm welcome: ("It's
over, darling. It's all over. And we're together for always");
he vowed: "I'm not going to
let you out of my sight, not till we're married. You understand that?...I'm
going to make it up to you. I'm going to make things easy for you.
I never want to see you cry again - except with happiness" -
they renewed their romance and lives
- Roy proposed taking her to his family's estate in
Scotland to again meet with Lady Margaret; Myra became very embarrassed
and avoided telling Roy about her profession as a prostitute; when
he became suspicious, she confessed that there was no one else: "Oh,
Roy, of course there isn't anyone else. There couldn't be. I loved
you. I've never loved anyone else. I never shall. That's the truth,
Roy"
- however, Myra soon realized that her deceptive ploy
would not work, and would only bring shame to Roy's family; she
became distraught and suicidal, feeling degraded by her indiscretions
and deception, and fearing that her secrets would resurface and prevent
them from marrying
- Myra called
Roy's consoling mother Lady Margaret "naive" about her
life, and was able to confess her unworthy profession: ("I
can't marry Roy...I must go away. I should never have come here. I
knew it was impossible but I kept deceiving myself. I've got to go
away. I must never see him again...That thought which is now in your
mind which you are telling yourself can't be true is true"); she
had Lady Margaret promise not to tell Roy, and then in the hallway,
Roy returned her good-luck charm to her: ("I think you'd better
have it from now on because now that we're both, as they say, one")
- by the next morning, Myra had left a farewell note
for Roy: ("You have been more to me than I will ever say in
words. But there is no future for us. I am grateful to you for what
you are and for what you have meant to me. I cannot write - Goodbye
my dearest darling") and then returned to London
- to prove that Myra had told the truth, her roommate/best
friend Kitty first asked Roy if he could handle the truth ("Roy,
can you take it no matter what you find out about her?"); she
revealed the reality of Myra's nightlife to a disbelieving Roy by
taking him through one seedy bar after another, but they were unable
to find her; Kitty admitted: "She couldn't go through with it.
She was too honest"
- in the film's most tragic and downbeat scene on a
foggy night, the impoverished and depressed Myra eluded Roy and deliberately
walked into oncoming traffic on Waterloo Bridge, where she was struck
and killed by a truck; the good-luck charm fell from her hand onto
the pavement
- the film returned to the beginning, as General Roy
Cronin was on the bridge and clutching her good-luck charm before
leaving for the front; in his memory years later, he tearfully recalled
her earlier words in the film's final melodramatic moments: (Myra's
voice-over) ("I loved you. I've never loved anyone else. I never
shall. That's the truth, Roy. I never shall"); the playing of "Auld
Lang Syne" rose on the soundtrack
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In an Underground Shelter Together: Myra and Capt. Roy
Cronin
Waltzing in Candlelight and a First Kiss
Marriage Proposal the Next Day
Waving Goodbye to Roy as His Train Departed
Myra Dismissed From the Ballet Company by Madame Kirowa, And Supported by Her
Friend Kitty (Virginia Field)
Myra at the London Train Station - Shocked to See Roy
Returning and Alive
Myra to Roy: "I've never loved anyone else. I never shall"
Myra to Lady Margaret: "I can't marry Roy!"
Myra's Farewell Note to Roy
Myra's Suicidal Decision to Jump In Front of a Truck
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