Somerset Maugham's OF HUMAN BONDAGE (Ανθρώπινη Δουλεία) ENG SUB, Full: PAUL HENREID, Eleanor Parker, Edmund Gwenn, Janis Paige, Alexis Smith - 1944

A very rare, classic testimony based on the illustrious novel OF HUMAN BONDAGE (1915), written by the famed English author William Somerset Maugham. The autobiographical novel -influenced by the theories of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Samuel Butler on art, painting and writing- is considered as Somerset Maugham's masterpiece -and he, also, thought it was his best work. Maugham, who had originally planned to call his novel BEAUTY FROM ASHES, finally draw the title taken from a section of Spinoza's "Ethics". The initial title was BEAUTY FROM THE ASHES was borrowed from Isaiah 61:3, "... to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair". The final title came from Spinoza's part IV of ''Ethics'' where it is said "Of Human Bondage, or the Strength of the Emotions" (Latin: De servitute humana seu de affectuum viribus). In this part, Spinoza discusses people's inability to control their emotions which, thus, constitute bondage. He also defines good and bad categories based on the people's general beliefs, connecting it to their “emotions of pleasure or pain”. He defines perfectness/imperfectness starting out from the desire, in its meaning of particular aims and plans. The novel was adapted for the wide screen by the American author, playwright -and theatrical actress- Catherine Turney. THE GREAT STAR OF THE FILM IS PAUL HENREID, the double (or doppelganger) of the philosopher Albert Camus. Τhe film was produced by Heinz (Henry) Blanke, who was of German descent but lived in the U.S. after 1922. Music by Erich Wolfgang Korngold. Directed by the English actor, playwright and screenwriter Edmound Goulding (who lived in the U.S. after 1921) at the Warner Brothers' Studios in Burbank, California. THE FILM WAS COMPLETED IN 1944, not in 1946. The picture was held back until its Manhattan premiere at the Strand Theatre on July 5, 1946. It is the second film version of Somerset Maugham's classic novel OF HUMAN BONDAGE, set in the Victorian Era: the first was the 1934 film adaptation (starring Leslie Howard and Bette Davis) and the third was the 1964 film adaptation (starring Laurence Harvey and Kim Novak) but there is also a wonderful, short TV film of 1949, starring Charlton Heston.