Beware of Pity
Encyclopedia
Beware of Pity is a 1946 British
Cinema of the United Kingdom
The United Kingdom has had a major influence on modern cinema. The first moving pictures developed on celluloid film were made in Hyde Park, London in 1889 by William Friese Greene, a British inventor, who patented the process in 1890. It is generally regarded that the British film industry...

 romantic drama film starring Lilli Palmer
Lilli Palmer
Lilli Palmer , born Lilli Marie Peiser, was a German actress. She won the Volpi Cup, the Deutscher Filmpreis three times, and was nominated twice for a Golden Globe Award.-Life and career:...

, Albert Lieven
Albert Lieven
Albert Lieven was a German actor. He was born Albert Fritz Liévin in Hohenstein, East Prussia. He died in London, England. He was married four times, including to the actresses Susan Shaw and Valerie White....

 and Cedric Hardwicke
Cedric Hardwicke
Sir Cedric Webster Hardwicke was a noted English stage and film actor whose career spanned nearly fifty years...

. It is based on the novel of the same name by Stefan Zweig
Stefan Zweig
Stefan Zweig was an Austrian novelist, playwright, journalist and biographer. At the height of his literary career, in the 1920s and 1930s, he was one of the most famous writers in the world.- Biography :...

. A paraplegic
Paraplegia
Paraplegia is an impairment in motor or sensory function of the lower extremities. The word comes from Ionic Greek: παραπληγίη "half-striking". It is usually the result of spinal cord injury or a congenital condition such as spina bifida that affects the neural elements of the spinal canal...

 young baroness mistakes compassion for love.

Plot

When a young man comes to aged Anton Marek (Albert Lieven) for romantic advice, Marek tells him a story from his own past, which leads to a flashback.

In the days leading up to World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

, Lieutenant Marek is assigned to an Austro-Hungarian
Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary , more formally known as the Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Holy Hungarian Crown of Saint Stephen, was a constitutional monarchic union between the crowns of the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary in...

 regiment stationed in a small town. There he meets Baroness Edith de Kekesfalva (Lilli Palmer), a young woman who is a paraplegic as the result of a horse riding accident. Noticing how the young man has cheered up his depressed daughter, Baron Emil de Kekesfalva (Ernest Thesiger
Ernest Thesiger
Ernest Frederic Graham Thesiger CBE was an English stage and film actor. He is best known for his performance as Dr...

) asks him to spend time with her. Marek finds her company pleasant enough and agrees.

The baron has consulted many renowned doctors in vain; none hold out any hope for his daughter's recovery. Finally, in desperation, he has turned to hardworking, dedicated Dr. Albert Condor (Cedric Hardwicke), who at least refuses to give up. Condor notices a great improvement in Edith's attitude, which he accurately ascribes to her falling in love with Marek. Marek remains unaware of Edith's feelings for him.

One day, Marek tells the family about a promising treatment in Switzerland, despite Condor's warning to wait until he has had a chance to investigate. Condor later informs him that it cannot help Edith, but by then the damage is done. With the hope of being able to walk again unassisted, Edith reveals her love for Marek. Guilt-ridden, the young man pretends to love her and agrees to marry her after she is cured.

However, when rumors of the engagement leak out, Marek angrily denies them to his questioning, disapproving fellow officers. When he is confronted by his commanding officer, Marek admits the truth. To minimize the scandal, his commander immediately arranges his transfer to another unit far away.

Marek goes to see Condor before he leaves, but the doctor is away. Instead, Condor's blind wife Klara (Gladys Cooper
Gladys Cooper
Dame Gladys Constance Cooper, DBE was an English actress whose career spanned seven decades on stage, in films and on television....

) speaks with him. She gets him to recognize that he may love Edith after all. He tries to telephone Edith, but the lines are barred from civilian use because of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand
Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria
On 28 June 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir presumptive to the Austro-Hungarian throne, and his wife, Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg, were shot dead in Sarajevo, by Gavrilo Princip, one of a group of six Bosnian Serb assassins coordinated by Danilo Ilić...

 that same day. Marek must take the train to report for duty with his new unit, but Klara assures him she will see Edith and clear things up.

When Klara visits Edith, she finds her alone on the rooftop terrace of her family's mountainside mansion. Edith has heard about Marek's public denial of their engagement and no longer trusts anyone. With Klara powerless to stop her, she wheels herself to the edge and flings herself over to her death.

Cast

  • Lilli Palmer as Baroness Edith de Kekesfalva
  • Albert Lieven as Lt. Anton Marek
  • Cedric Hardwicke as Dr. Albert Condor
  • Gladys Cooper
    Gladys Cooper
    Dame Gladys Constance Cooper, DBE was an English actress whose career spanned seven decades on stage, in films and on television....

     as Mrs. Klara Condor
  • Linden Travers
    Linden Travers
    -Life and career:Travers was born Florence Lindon-Travers in Houghton-le-Spring, near Sunderland, the daughter of Florence and William Halton Lindon-Travers. She was the elder sister of Bill Travers, and attended La Sagesse. She made her first stage appearance at the Newcastle Playhouse in 1933...

     as Ilona Domansky, Edith's companion
  • Ernest Thesiger
    Ernest Thesiger
    Ernest Frederic Graham Thesiger CBE was an English stage and film actor. He is best known for his performance as Dr...

     as Baron Emil de Kekesfalva
  • Emrys Jones as Lt. Joszi Molnar
  • Ralph Truman
    Ralph Truman
    Ralph Truman was an English actor, usually cast as either a villain or an authority figure. He possessed a distinguished speaking voice...

     as Maj. Sandor Balinkay
  • Fritz Wendhausen as Josef, a Kekesfalva family servant (as Frederick Wendhausen)
  • John Salew as Col. Franz Bubencic
  • Freda Jackson
    Freda Jackson
    Freda Maud Jackson was an English stage actress who also worked in film and TV. Born in Nottingham, she was famous for her stage role as the cruel landlady Mrs. Voray in the play No Room at the Inn in the mid-1940s; she appeared in the film adaptation of 1948...

    as Gypsy, a fortune teller who foretells a happy future for Edith
  • Gerhard Kempinski as Mayor Jan Nivak
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