OF HUMAN BONDAGE

OF HUMAN BONDAGE:

PHILLIP, HEATHCLIFF, AND…TOM?

SPOILER ALERT

We’ve all done it, allowed ourselves to believe that we can change someone’s heart by finding the right combination of words and actions, but few of us go to the extremes that Phillip Carey does in Of Human Bondage.  An adaptation of what is considered W. Somerset Maugham’s best novel, the movie portrays Phillip (Laurence Harvey) as a hapless suitor who spends years trying to convince Mildred (Kim Novak), a popular waitress at a local tea shop, to fall in love with him.  Since a little more background would be helpful to understanding the main character, I have included some useful information from the novel. 

Phillip’s parents die when he is quite young and he is raised by an aunt and uncle, Louisa and William Carey, who are old and childless.  William, a vicar in the Church of England, is a selfish, conceited, inflexible man who bullies his wife, a gentle soul that bows to her husband’s wishes without complaint, and is overly strict with Phillip. Because the reverend expects his nephew to join the clergy, Phillip is sent away to school where students tease him about his club foot.  Although he is very bright and does well in his studies, he is unhappy there and finally convinces his uncle to let him finish his education in Germany.  Afterwards, he returns home for a short stay then moves to London to be an apprentice in accounting, a field for which he has little aptitude.  Disappointed once again, he decides to go to Paris and study art because he has always had a flare for drawing.  Two years later Phillip’s instructor informs him that, although his ability demonstrates proficiency, it does not show any talent.   In an effort to be helpful, the man suggests that Phillip pursue medicine because he has a strong grasp of human anatomy. This is where the movie begins. 

Phillip has a small inheritance from his father, and he uses that to pay for medical school in London where the instructors warn the students that most of them will flunk out.  Although his grades are not stellar, things go all right until his classmate Matthews (Ronald Lacey) asks Phillip and his friend Griffiths (Jack Hedley), who is infamous for his way with the ladies, to accompany him to a local tea shop where there is a waitress he wants to ask out.  The young woman whose name Mildred is pretty and popular, but she treats Matthews so rudely that he immediately changes his mind and leaves, taking Griffiths with him.  Having little experience with women, however, Phillip is enamored by the young lady’s comely appearance and impressed by her self-confidence, overlooking that it borders on outright conceit.  Hoping to impress Mildred, Phillip makes a sketch of her but when she turns her nose up at it, he asks her to have dinner with him.  Rather than graciously accepting, Mildred noncommittally answers, “I don’t mind”, a phrase that will become all too familiar over time.  

Against the advice of Griffiths, who realizes that Mildred is a heartless bitch, Phillip continues taking her out, but while he falls more deeply in love at each encounter, she keeps him at arm’s length.   She refuses to let him walk her home and constantly reminds him that he pales in comparison to her other suitors, of which there have been many.  Although Phillip is well aware that Mildred does not love him, he continues trying to win her over.  He becomes so obsessed in his quest that he fails exams, fritters away his paltry inheritance, and forgives her infidelities.  He is only able to stop the futile pursuit when she tells him that she is getting married to Miller, a man who Phillip has seen her talking with at the shop but wasn’t aware she was dating.

After Mildred goes away, Griffiths tries to help Phillip forget his heartache by taking him to a party at the home of Nora (Siobhan McKenna), a successful author who writes the trashy romance novels that Mildred likes.  He and Nora begin dating and soon are seeing one another quite regularly.  No longer overwhelmed by his desire for Mildred, Phillip starts to do well in school and save what little is left of his money.  Then one evening he steps into his rooming house and finds her sitting on the stairs waiting for him.  Although his reception is cold, it is obvious that he hungers to know why she is there.  When Mildred relates that Miller, who it turns out is already married, has gotten her pregnant then thrown her over, Phillip saves the day by renting a room for her and hiring a wet nurse to care for the baby after it is born, a decision that he strongly disapproves of but pays for anyway. 

As soon as Mildred is free of her cumbersome pregnancy, she begs Phillip to take her out and bring along Griffiths so she can dance, cruelly casting veiled aspersions at his club foot.  Although he clearly doesn’t want to, Phillip agrees, a decision he quickly regrets because his girl and his best friend flirt with each other all night long.  Feeling ill-used, Phillip tells Mildred that Griffiths isn’t really interested in her, but instead of listening to him, she produces a letter in which Griffiths declares his love.  Once again, she dumps Phillip for another man, but this time he does not allow her betrayal to derail his life.  Instead he continues his studies at the hospital where two significant things occur: he is befriended by a patient named Thorpe Athelny (Roger Livesey), an intelligent man who has a lovely daughter named Sally (Nannette Newman), and he learns from Griffiths that the thoughtless fling with Mildred is over and she has become a prostitute.    

Phillip goes looking for Mildred and finds her in a seedy alley wearing heavy make-up and trolling for customers.  Even though her reaction to being found out is hateful, Phillip insists on helping her and the baby.  Without any resources of her own, Mildred reluctantly agrees to move in with him.  Their circumstances are reversed, however, and now Mildred is the one begging for attention by offering Phillip sex and Phillip is the one holding back by saying that she disgusts him.  Unsurprisingly, she responds to his rejection by calling him a pathetic cripple.  Rather than being swayed by her tantrum, Phillip walks out and spends the day with Sally.  Upon returning home that evening, he finds Mildred and the baby gone and his sketches and medical books destroyed.  No longer affected by her vindictiveness, however, Phillip completes his education, and after receiving his degree in medicine, begins working in the hospital’s clinic.     

One day Mildred comes in complaining of a sore throat.  Already suspecting that she has syphilis, Phillip takes a blood sample and when the test results come back positive, he goes to the filthy hovel where she lives to give her the diagnosis.  Instead of heeding his warnings that she will die if she doesn’t get treatment, Mildred berates him, and he silently walks out.   Sometime later, Griffiths informs Phillip that Mildred has been admitted to the hospital and is dying.  Still inexplicably drawn to his former lover, Phillip goes to her bedside where she asks him to give her a proper funeral.  Instead of agreeing to this final request, Phillip idealistically vows that he won’t let her die because he still loves her, the only promise he’s ever made to her the he can’t keep.   

After Mildred’s death, Phillip packs his things with the intention of going away, but as he starts to walk out the door Althelny comes by to tell him that Sally loves him and will never let him go.  Unconvinced, Phillip goes by the cemetery to watch Mildred’s burial before leaving town; when he returns to his wagon, Sally is standing there waiting for him. 

Someone who has read Of Human Bondage can see similarities between the methods Phillip uses to make the coldhearted Mildred love him and the nagging and pouting he used as a child to get his way with his equally egocentric uncle.  What Phillip does not take into account, is that his ploy worked with the vicar because the man cared about him whereas Mildred does not.  On another level, although there are no ghosts, crumbling mansions, or dreary moors, there are detectable likenesses between Phillip and the protagonists of gothic romances.  A good example is Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights.  In the 1939 film version, which differs greatly from the novel but remains true to the star-crossed lovers’ characters, Heathcliff (Rex Downing as a child and Laurence Olivier as an adult) is portrayed as an orphan who is adopted and raised by a kind landowner named Mr. Earnshaw (Cecil Kellaway).  He treats the dark gypsy-like boy as equal to his own children; Cathy (Sarita Wooton as a child and Merle Oberon as an adult), a high spirited child who loves Heathcliff, and Hindley (Douglas Scott as a child and Hugh Williams as an adult), a spoiled sulky boy who resents him.  After Mr. Earnshaw dies, Hindley becomes lord of the manor and demotes Heathcliff to servant status.  Cathy and Heathcliff remain close, however, and they spend many happy hours roaming the moors until she is bitten by the dogs at the neighboring estate owned by Edgar (David Niven) and Isabella Linton (Geraldine Fitzgerald).  She is forced to stay there while recuperating, and becomes close to the pair, especially Edgar who falls in love with her.  By the time she returns to Wuthering Heights, Cathy is changed.  Her dress and manners are ladylike, and she is embarrassed by Heathcliff’s uncouth behavior.  Devastated, the young man runs away. 

Heathcliff returns wealthy, dressed like a gentleman.  Hindley, who has gambled his inheritance away, owes a lot of money, and by paying off his debts, Heathcliff acquires Wuthering Heights in hopes of recapturing Cathy’s heart.  When he discovers that she has married Edgar however, he elopes with Isabella in retaliation and mistreats her.  Unable to be with Heathcliff but incapable of being happy without him, Cathy falls ill and dies. Heathcliff often hears her ghost calling to him and one cold winter night, he follows the voice onto the moors that they so loved as children where he freezes to death and joins her in eternity.   

It is not difficult to see many similarities between Phillip and Heathcliff.  Both are impoverished orphans who endure social rejection and cruelty due to a physical defect, Phillip a club foot, Heathcliff, the appearance of a gypsy.    Each falls in love with someone who rejects him, Phillip, Mildred, Heathcliff, Cathy, while eschewing a much more suitable mate in the process, Phillip, Nora, Heathcliff, Isabella.  The biggest difference between the two, is that Phillip saves himself by turning to Sally while Heathcliff dies because he can love none other than Cathy.    The novel Wuthering Heights can be downloaded from the Gutenberg Project at no cost.  The movie, of which there are many versions, is streaming on a lot of services, some that are free.  I prefer the original starring Merle Oberon and Laurence Olivier (before he was a Sir) but there are at least four others.

If you like more contemporary fare, a similar theme of unrequited love is found in the 2009 film (500) Days of Summer starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Tom and Zooey Deschanel as Summer.  Like Heathcliff, and Phillip, Tom hangs on much too tightly to someone who doesn’t want him.  Summer explains her disinterest by declaring that she doesn’t believe in love.  Under such circumstances, the relationship naturally fails.  When Tom runs into Summer a year after their breakup and learns that she is getting married, he comes away hurt and baffled.  It is Tom’s half-sister, Rachel (Chloe Grace Moretz), who points out what should have been obvious all along: it wasn’t that Summer couldn’t love, but that she couldn’t love him.  It’s too bad that Phillip and Heathcliff didn’t have the opportunity to be advised by Rachel who, in a nutshell says, instead of trying to make someone love you that can’t, find someone who can.  I didn’t see a written version of (500) Days of Summer, but the movie, which has an 85% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, can be bought online for a reasonable price, or rented on Redbox. 

I am familiar with two good versions of Of Human Bondage, one from 1938 starring Bette Davis as Mildred and another from 1964 which casts Kim Novak in the role.  Although it only got a 54% on Rotten Tomatoes, I prefer the latter one because I think Ms. Novak does a better job of capturing Mildred’s persona.  The DVD can be bought on websites like Amazon and Best Buy for around $18 or can be rented on Amazon, Google Play, or Apple TV.  The earlier version with Bette Davis is streaming for free on a variety of services.  I have not seen the 1946 version, but even though it only has a 38% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, I might give it a glance someday.

That’s all for now.  I’ll be back in a couple of weeks to talk about my favorite Christmas movie, Mixed Nuts which has an all-star cast that includes Steve Martin, Madeline Kahn, Juliette Lewis, and Adam Sandler, to name just a few.  Until then, enjoy a bunch of flicks.