Dark Victory story
Dark Victory is a 1939 American melodrama film directed by Edmund Goulding, starring Bette Davis, and featuring George Brent, Humphrey Bogart, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Ronald Reagan, Henry Travers, and Cora Witherspoon. The screenplay by Casey Robinson was based on the 1934 play of the same title by George Brewer and Bertram Bloch, starring Tallulah Bankhead.
16 total · 3 choice · 10 major · 3 minor
| Theme | Level | Motivation |
|---|---|---|
| coming to terms with one's own death | choice | Judith initially did everything she could do pretend that she wasn't sick, and later that she wasn't dying. In the end, however, she made some sort of peace with the inevitable. |
| coping with a terminal illness | choice | The story concerns Judith's, and her friends', struggle to come to terms with the fact that she was suffering from terminal glioma. It concerns the manner in which Judith would eventually choose to meet her inevitable fate. At first Judith resolved to booze her head off, but she later let herself be convinced that she must lead out her few remaining days in a more meaningful manner. |
| romantic love | choice | The story concerns the relationship between Judith and Dr. Steele, who fell in love and in the end got married. |
| carefree way of life | major | Judith's carefree and purposeless life of frivolity was compared and contrasted with that of the dutiful, stoic, Dr. Steele who notably did not partake of alcohol. |
| coping with a loved one being gravely ill | major | Ann was devastated upon finding out that her best friend, Judith, had less than a year to live due to a glioma. Dr. Steele coped with his patient and lover, Judith, being terminally ill with brain cancer. |
| courage in the face of death | major | Judith initially tried to run away from her terminal prognosis, but ultimately she met her fate with a brave face. |
| cure for cancer | major | Dr. Steele was conducting ground breaking medical research out of a shed in Vermont that held the long-term prospect of a cure for glioma brain tumors. |
| doctor and patient romance | major | Judith and her physician, Dr. Steele, fell in love while he was treating her for brain cancer. They ended up tying the knot. |
| friendship | major | Ann was devastated upon finding out that her best friend, Judith, had less than a year to live due to a glioma. |
| human aspiration | major | Dr. Steele had devoted himself to medical research. He abstained from alcohol and other frivolities that might get in the way of his goal of curing cancer. |