The White Cliffs of Dover *** (1944, Irene Dunne, Alan Marshal, Roddy McDowall, Frank Morgan, Van Johnson, Dame May Whitty, C Aubrey Smith, Elizabeth Taylor) – Classic Movie Review 10,459

Director Clarence Brown’s poignant, well-made but over-sentimental 1944 tearjerker The White Cliffs of Dover stars Irene Dunne as American heroine Lady Susan Dunn Ashwood, who sits idyllically on the white clifftops of Dover with her British aristocrat husband Sir John Ashwood (Alan Marshal) before he is killed in World War One.

Peter Lawford plays her son John Ashwood II, who follows his father’s footsteps in World War Two. The London based American nurse Lady Susan is now at a hospital awaiting the arrival of wounded soldiers, and hoping her son is not among the wounded, as she recalls the events of World War One.

The White Cliffs of Dover is not in the Mrs Miniver class, thanks to Claudine West and Jan Lustig’s superficial screenplay, based on Alice Duer Miller’s poem, but the splendid cast and the MGM production are extremely polished. George J Folsey was Oscar nominated for Best Cinematography, Black-and-White.

Elizabeth Taylor appears uncredited as the 10-year-old Betsy. Her real-life life-long pal Roddy McDowall plays John Ashwood II as a boy. They also appear together in Lassie Come Home (1943).

Also in the cast are Frank Morgan, Dame May Whitty, Roddy McDowall, C Aubrey Smith, Elizabeth Taylor, Norma Varden, Gladys Cooper, Peter Lawford, Van Johnson, June Lockhart, Charles Irwin, John Warburton, Jean Prescott, Tom Drake, Isobel Elsom, Edmond Breon, Miles Mander, Ann Curzon. Molly Lamont, Lumsden Hare, Arthur Shields, and Ian Wolfe.

© Derek Winnert 2020 Classic Movie Review 10,459

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