Lady in the Dark
July 1944Dearest Reader,
The film my grandmother saw in 1944 was Lady in the Dark, starring Ginger Rogers. Although she remembered it as Woman in the Dark. Released in 1944, Lady in the Dark tells the story of Liza Elliott, a successful magazine editor suffering from anxiety, mood swings and troubling dreams. The movie explores her struggle with what was then called psychoneurosis, following her through a series of psychoanalytic sessions in which a doctor helps her uncover childhood trauma buried beneath her polished exterior. The film was one of Hollywood’s early attempts to portray mental and emotional conflict on screen. For 1944, the film’s frank depiction of inner turmoil and psychoanalysis made it both unusual and modern.
Dr. Nancy Watson
Rambling With Nan
Washington
Read More From Nancy
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In another passage of her December 13, 1941 letter, my grandmother reveals how personally the attack on Pearl Harbor was being felt, even far from Hawaii. The war was no longer an abstract headline, it had names, faces and families attached to it. She wrote: “Vincent McDowell was at Schofield Barracks in Honolulu. Mrs McDowell […]
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On Thursday, July 6, 1944, my grandmother sat at her typewriter once again to write to my father. It seems she wrote every day with letters mixed of small local happenings, the weather and some words of advice for her only son. In this letter her daily life intersects with the larger rhythm of a […]
