Sadder than this very moving film are the reactions of those who found this movie boring or too "slow." What a comment on the need for car chases and explosions that seem so pervasive in American flicks!! One of the reason I prefer foreign films.
"Mr and Mrs Bridge" is an amazingly accurate depiction of upper middle class lives, caught in the trap of repression and respectability. To watch the fate of Mrs Bridge (exquisitely portrayed by Joanne Woodward) as a woman trapped in a marriage to an inexpressive, career-focused man is to understand how women, even today, can lead limited, unfulfilled lives, bound up with a decisive husband and children who grow into self-absorbed adults, leaving their mother with a longing they won't or can't assuage.
Seeing the character of Mr. Bridge (another outstanding performance by Paul Newman), himself caught in the routine of his life, his sexual yearnings repressed, convinced of his correctness and respectability is a picture of the rigidity of ideas, values and prejudices rampant in our society, even in our own time.
An amazing and insight movie!!
