Dreaming Lips (1937 film)

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Dreaming Lips
Dreaming Lips (1937 film).jpg
Directed by Paul Czinner
Written by Henri Bernstein (play)
Cynthia Asquith
Margaret Kennedy
Carl Mayer
Produced by Max Schach
Paul Czinner
Starring Elisabeth Bergner
Romney Brent
Raymond Massey
Joyce Bland
Cinematography Lee Garmes
Edited by David Lean
Music by William Walton
Production
company
Trafalgar Film Productions
Distributed by United Artists
Release date
  • 2 February 1937 (1937-02-02)
Running time
94 minutes
CountryUnited Kingdom
Language English

Dreaming Lips is a 1937 British drama film directed by Paul Czinner and starring Elisabeth Bergner, Romney Brent and Raymond Massey. [1]

Contents

Plot

The wife of a violin player in a famous orchestra, falls in love with her husband's friend and, tragically, drowns herself.

Cast

Production

The film was produced by Trafalgar Film Productions with art direction by Thomas N. Morahan. It was a remake of the 1932 German film Dreaming Lips also directed by Czinner and starring Bergner which had been based on the play Mélo by Henri Bernstein. In 1953 Josef von Báky remade the film in Germany, based on the original script by Czinner and Mayer.

The script would be Mayer's last, as he would die of cancer in 1944. [2]

Reception

The film was well received by critics, but not as financially successful as had been hoped. [2] Writing for The Spectator in 1937, Graham Greene gave the film a mixed review, describing it as "a shapely piece of sentiment" with a story "neat and plausible, the acting refined, the photography expensive". Greene, however, complains that its "sumptuous gloss[iness]" loses authenticity and that "there is nothing to remember when the night's over". [3]

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Dreaming Lips may refer to:

<i>Dreaming Lips</i> (1953 film) 1953 film

Dreaming Lips is a 1953 German drama film directed by Josef von Báky and starring Maria Schell, O. W. Fischer and Philip Dorn. It was shot at the Wandsbek Studios and on location around Hamburg. The film's sets were designed by the art directors Emil Hasler and Peter Röhrig. It is a remake of the 1932 film Dreaming Lips by Paul Czinner. Czinner had also remade the film in Britain in 1937.

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References

  1. "Dreaming Lips". BFI Film Database. Archived from the original on 13 January 2009.
  2. 1 2 Howard Maxford (30 October 2014). David Lean. Pavilion Books. pp. 27–. ISBN   978-1-84994-248-5.
  3. Greene, Graham (19 February 1937). "The Deserter/Dreaming Lips". The Spectator . (reprinted in: Taylor, John Russell, ed. (1980). The Pleasure Dome. Oxford University Press. p. 133. ISBN   0192812866.)