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Plot

Wearing a curiously (and perhaps deliberately) unattractive blonde wig, Jean Simmons stars in the tense psychological drama Home Before Dark. Having just recovered from a nervous breakdown, Charlotte Bronn (Simmons) returns from a mental institution to the home she shares with her academician husband Arnold (Dan O'Herlihy). Though he tries his best to help Charlotte re-adapt, his efforts are undermined by the insensitive meddling of her stepmother Inez (Mabel Albertson) and stepsister Joan (Rhonda Fleming) who may or may not have been carrying on a romance with Arnold in Charlotte's absence. The untenable situation at home leads Charlotte into a romance with college professor Jake Diamond (Efrem Zimbalist Jr.), who as an ongoing target of anti-semitism has plenty of his own emotional baggage to deal with. What is remarkable about Home Before Dark is that it is a film without a villain: even the most unpleasant characters are drawn as three-dimensional human beings, who behave badly because they really don't know any better. The film was adapted by Robert and Eileen Bassing from Eileen's same-named novel.
MPAA Rating:
Genre(s):
Drama,Romance
Run Time:
136min.
Distributor(s):
Warner Brothers
Director(s):
Mervyn LeRoy
Starring:
Jean Simmons , Dan O'Herlihy , Rhonda Fleming , Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. , Mabel Albertson
Keywords:
Judaism,college,craziness,extramarital-affair,faculty,home,homecoming,husband,institution,love,mental-illness,mental-institution,overcome,partner,readjustment,return,romance,society,stepmother,stepsister,struggle