Bette Davis, George Brent
“Dark Victory” screens at 1:30 p.m. Saturday, April 19, 2014 in the Durwood Film Vault of the Kansas City Central Library, 14W. 10th St. Admission is free. It’s part of the year-long film series Hollywood’s Greatest Year, featuring movies released in 1939.
“Dark Victory” is one of those old-fashioned weepies that sophisticated film goers hate to love.
But then, ever since its release in 1939 this Bette Davis classic has left audiences torn between helpless sobbing and a slow-burning resentment over the picture’s emotional manipulation.
Davis, who was nominated for a best actress Oscar (she lost to Vivien Leigh in “Gone With the Wind”), plays spoiled, vivacious heiress Judith Traherne, who is diagnosed with a brain tumor and falls in love with the surgeon who goes poking around in her noggin.
Problem is, after the surgery the M.D. realizes the tumor will come back with fatal results. But he doesn’t tell his patient of the grim diagnosis (a choice that today would get his license yanked), allowing her to go along with her flighty life. Judith will feel perfectly fine until the day ten months hence when she goes suddenly blind and drops dead.
Butler's Cinema Scene 