The River **** (1951, Esmond Knight, Nora Swinburne, Adrienne Corri, Patricia Walters, Thomas E Breen) – Classic Movie Review 3245

French master director Jean Renoir turns Rumer Godden’s romantic auto-biographical novel about an English family on the banks of the Ganges into this beautifully filmed (on location in Bengal in India), rich and compelling 1951 drama.

The family’s calm life is disturbed by the arrival of an older American war veteran army soldier, Captain John (Thomas E Breen), to ask for the hand of his cousin’s daughter, setting off romantic fantasies of the young folk. Captain John will be the first love of the three teenage girls who are living in Bengal near a grand river.

Performance-wise, there is classy playing from real-life couple Esmond Knight and Nora Swinburne as The Father and The Mother, and Adrienne Corri (Valerie, the only daughter of an American industrialist) and Patricia Walters (Harriet, the oldest child of the big family of English settlers) as the teenagers who have crushes on the soldier. Breen is less persuasive in a hesitant performance, despite looking the part. Radha plays the equally lovestruck Melanie, who has an American father and an Indian mother.

This is a beautiful, gorgeous film, both emotionally and visually, and the director’s nephew, ace French cinematographer Claude Renoir, photographs it all exquisitely in glorious Technicolor.

Also in the cast are, Arthur Shields, Richard R Foster, Penelope Wilkinson, Suprova Mukerjee, June Hillman, Nimai Barik, Jane Harris, Jennifer Harris, Trilak Jetley, Ram Singh and Cecilia Wood. The screenplay is by Jean Renoir and Rumer Godden.

© Derek Winnert 2015 Classic Movie Review 3245

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