If Winter Comes
| If Winter Comes | |
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Theatrical poster
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| Directed by | Victor Saville |
| Produced by | Pandro S. Berman |
| Written by |
Arthur Wimperis Marguerite Roberts A.S.M. Hutchinson (novel) |
| Starring |
Walter Pidgeon Deborah Kerr Angela Lansbury Janet Leigh |
| Music by | Herbert Stothart |
| Cinematography | George J. Folsey |
| Edited by | Ferris Webster |
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Production
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| Distributed by | Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer |
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Release date
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Running time
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97 min |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $1,740,000 |
| Box office | $1,949,000 |
If Winter Comes is a 1947 drama film released by MGM. The movie was directed by Victor Saville, based on the novel by A.S.M. Hutchinson. The film tells the story of an English textbook writer who takes in a pregnant girl. The novel had previously been made into the 1923 film If Winter Comes.
Set in the English village Penny Green in 1939, the film focuses on Mark Sabre, an author and publisher who is unhappily married to Mabel, a humorless and cold woman who usually spends her days gossiping with the townspeople. When Mark finds out his former sweetheart Nona Tybar is returning to Penny Green, Mark, unlike his wife, is delighted. Nona is married to a man named Tony Tyber, but is still in love with Mark. Mabel is aware of Mark's feelings for Nona, and encourages him to spend time with her, thinking he will eventually decide with whom he wants to spend his life.
As the war starts, Tony is called into the military, while Mark attempts to join up but a doctor finds a heart condition and prevents him. Nona leaves Penny Green in order to join the Women's Auxiliary Air Force. Life becomes quiet for Mark, until Effie Bright, who is disowned by her father for having become pregnant, turns to him for help.
Mark helps Effie, and lets her live in his home while he looks for a better situation for her. This causes a great scandal. His boss had been looking for a way to fire Mark, and, as a result of the morals clause at his place of employment, he loses his job. Mabel leaves Mark, under the impression that Mark has fathered Effie's baby. The townspeople soon denounce Mark and when Effie, who was already mentally under stress because the father of her baby, off at war, hadn't written her, and she is served with the notice that she is co-respondent in the divorce, so she commits suicide by poisoning herself. At the inquest to determine Effie's cause of death, numerous witnesses give anecdotal incomplete evidence suggesting a sexual relationship between Mark and Effie. Nona appears, having just learned of Tony's death, and makes a short speech in support of Mark's character. The inquest determines that Effie's cause of death was suicide, though they censure Mark for his behavior.
Returning home, a distraught Mark finds a note addressed to him from Effie. In it, Effie names her lover. It happens to be Harold Twyning, the son of one of Mark's coworkers at the publishing company. Mark furiously heads to the company to confront the young Twyning's father, but when he gets there, the man is grief-stricken, just having received the news that his son has been killed in the war. Mark decides not to share the letter with him, but, just as he is about to burn the letter, he has a heart attack, and passes out.
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