Brief Encounter

Laura Jesson (Celia Johnson) and Dr. Alec Harvey (Trevor Howard) spend each Thursday in Milford - Laura running her shopping errands and catching a movie, and Alec doing rounds at the hospital - before each boards a train at the end of the afternoon, going in the opposite direction to their respective homes of Catchworth and Chorley. They meet accidentally enough in the Milford Junction refreshment room, while waiting for their respective trains, when Alec helps Laura remove a piece of coal dust from her eye. Over the course of a few weeks, seeing each other only on Thursdays, Laura and Alec fall in love. The problem is that each is already married: Laura, at least, unhappily so, and we are given to believe both are unfulfilled. Yet both feel obligation, if not desire, to remain in their respective marriages. Alec is the aggressor, but we witness, through voice-overs, the strength of Laura's emotional longing for him, as she struggles with whether to continue seeing Alec. The two have to decide how to deal with what looks to be an ongoing star-crossed platonic romance, while hiding their encounters from anyone, especially their friends and acquaintances who may see them together in Milford.