Winter Meeting (1948)

Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

The biggest problem with this movie is it’s a little better than you think it might be, which somehow makes it worse. As in, it takes itself a bit too seriously, which makes most of the movie feel kind of dull.

Bette is good when she's bad and better when subdued. Sometimes and this is one of these times. Bette is a spinster. Novak is a war hero. Actually I can see Novak falling for her over Janis Page. The key line was when he told her I could have her if I wanted her. Grieve and Novak were similar personalities. What I liked about it was their meeting was awkward and the movie was realistic in that sometimes things don't go smoothly, things move slow, but sometimes two people click just because they do. They both had baggage and could understand each other. This is one of the films that proved Bette could act. Another is the Star. This time Bette is being bad and another unlikely paring of Sterling Hayding and it still works!

In viewing the film, I first thought that Bette Davis was too old to play the part. As the film went on, I realized that Davis was needed to provide the necessary maturity for the part.In some respects, Bette, as Susan Grieve, reminded me of her portrayal of Charlotte Vale, 6 years before, in "Now, Voyager." Again, she plays a spinster at odds with her mother, who is about to embark upon a life without happiness. While she has her poetry in this film, she is consumed with the suicide death of her father and a mother who betrayed him.Along comes a war hero Slick Novak who is anything but slick. Everyone must have thought that as their love blossomed, he would confess to having a wife. This wasn't the case. I can imagine the amazement of the audience when he confessed that he had entertained thoughts since age 16 of becoming a priest.The picture ends on a high note as Davis does the right thing. She is not a cunning ingénue as was the case in so many of our films.The picture definitely picks up after both Slick and Susan confess their inner problems.

Every star must have at least one piece of work that absolutely stinks. Miss Bette and WINTER MEETING is a bore from the beginning. Susan Grieve(Davis)is a depressed poet that falls in love with a war hero(Jim Davis). The events of WW11 makes this soldier want to be a priest. Shared secrets over a nightcap is just not a remedy for the doldrums. A very wordy script and dour atmosphere throughout. Just little over an hour running time is a relief.The efforts of Jim Davis as the moody hero Slick Novak outshines Miss Davis. Also in the cast: Janis Paige, Walter Baldwin, Florence Bates and John Hoyt. If anything is redeeming its the score by Max Steiner.

Stories of emotional restraint between two people who meet on a chance encounter and have a shaky chance of developing have been done numerous times with fantastic success. Acting styles in more recent times have allowed actors to convey their passions brimming just beneath the surface with minimal dialogue than to talk without pauses and have the background music express more dramatizing than a Beethovian concerto.WINTER MEETING is one of these earlier efforts. It tells the story of war hero Slick Novak (Jim Davis of "Dallas" fame) who returns to American soil and is introduced to famed poet Susan Grieve (Bette Davis), a woman who is faintly cynic about relationships. Though at first she seems indifferent to Novak, once he stays over it becomes clear that both share an attraction to each other. The following day they drive off to Connecticut where she used to live and on the way they discover their inner baggage.What should have been a better movie is reduced to a flat drama that starts off well during the first thirty minutes (and this includes Janis Paige stealing her scenes as Peggy Markham who is also attracted to Slick Novak) but slows down to a standstill once Susan and Slick start interacting on their own (and they're the only ones on screen for much of the film). A scene inside Susan's kitchen, though trying to convey commonplace events, just doesn't feel right. However both actors have an unspoken chemistry that in the hands of a less stagy and more cinematic director would have brought out better, more involved performances. I think of the possibilities of Susan telling her tragic story as the camera maintains a constant movement and ice rain falls, or if more hints on Novak's ultimate intentions would have been peppered throughout. Or if less on screen talk and more body language would have been shown, incorporating synchronized cuts and long takes during key moments, all leading to a crescendo which would make the viewer really care for the characters. For this, the actors would have had to been of the type who would smolder even when repressing their emotions and neither of the Davises were known for this kind of screen presence. Also, this kind of film would only surface about 10 years later under the form of Hiroshima MON AMOUR and used to perfection as IN THE MOOD FOR LOVE. As such, WINTER MEETING remains confined to its stage and production values and while it's far from perfect, it has more pluses than minuses.