Of Human Bondage ** (1946, Paul Henreid, Eleanor Parker, Alexis Smith, Edmund Gwenn, Patric Knowles, Janis Paige) – Classic Movie Review 9155

Director Edmund Goulding’s 1946 black and white film of W Somerset Maugham’s novel Of Human Bondage has the misfortune to follow director John Cromwell’s much more exciting 1934 version of Of Human Bondage with the 26-year-old Bette Davis and Leslie Howard.

This time Eleanor Parker plays the cold and unfeeling trashy waitress Mildred Rogers, who gives wealthy, handicapped medical student Philip Carey (Paul Henreid) a bad time in late 1800s London. Mildred leaves Philip but becomes pregnant and returns for help.

The casting doesn’t seem strong enough, while the screenplay by Catherine Turney and Goulding’s direction don’t help at all, in this unconvincing, trivial second film version of the story. And, alas, the two players are at sea with the Somerset Maugham story material. Where’s the sexual chemistry? Henreid seems too old and mature, and too lacking in passion, and why does he care for the trampy Mildred when Parker cannot persuade us of her character’s charm and allure?

This remake of the 1934 film was remade again in 1964 as Of Human Bondage, with Laurence Harvey and Kim Novak.

Also in the cast are Alexis Smith, Edmund Gwenn, Patric Knowles, Janis Paige, Henry Stephenson, Marten Lamont, Isobel Elsom, Una O’Connor, Eva Moore, Richard Aherne [Richard Nugent], Bill Kennedy and Doris Lloyd.

Of Human Bondage is directed by Edmund Goulding, runs 105 minutes, is made and released by Warner Bros, is written by Catherine Turney, based on W Somerset Maugham’s novel, is shot in black and white by J Peverell Marley, is produced by Henry Blanke, is scored by Erich Wolfgang Korngold and is designed by Hugh Retticker.

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 9155

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