Mr. Skeffington

In 1914, spoiled Fanny Trellis (Bette Davis) is a renowned beauty with many suitors. She learns that her beloved brother Trippy (Richard Waring) has embezzled money from his employer, banker Job Skeffington (Claude Rains). To save Trippy from prosecution, Fanny pursues and marries the love struck and older Job. Disgusted by the arrangement, in part because of his prejudice against Job's Jewish heritage, Trippy leaves home to fight in the Lafayette Escadrille in World War I. Job loves Fanny, but she largely ignores him. She becomes pregnant, but when she receives news that Trippy has died in France, she laments that she is "stuck" with Job, and their marriage then becomes wholly loveless, continuing only for the sake of their daughter, also named Fanny (child: Sylvia Arslan). Job and George (Walter Abel), Fanny's cousin, also enlist, but are stationed near home. Fanny continues to enjoy the role of the wealthy socialite, stringing along a persistent quartet of suitors who are unfazed by her marriage, as well as much younger lovers. Lonely, Job finds solace with his secretaries. When Fanny finds out, she divorces him, conveniently ignoring her own behavior. Fanny neglects her daughter (older: Marjorie Riordan), who understandably prefers her loving father and begs him to take her with him to Europe. Although Job fears for his daughter and tries unsuccessfully to explain to her the nature of prejudice she will encounter as a Jew abroad, he finally, tearfully and joyfully, says yes. Fanny is relieved to be free of the responsibility of a child. She has a series of affairs, living well on the extremely generous settlement Job has left her - half his fortune - and hardly giving a thought to her daughter, whom she does not see for many years. Fanny retains her beauty as she grows older (much to the envy of her female acquaintances), but when she catches diphtheria, it ravages her appearance. In denial, she invites her old lovers (and their wives) to a party. The men are shocked (and the women relieved) by Fanny's changed appearance, leaving her distraught. Her latest young suitor, Johnny Mitchell (Johnny Mitchell), falls in love with her daughter, who has returned from Europe due to the rise of the Nazis. They marry a few months later and leave for Seattle. Fanny's daughter tells her that, while she wishes her well, she feels no real love for her, and pities her for discarding Job, the only man who ever truly loved her. Shortly before her daughter's departure, Fanny suffers the ultimate humiliation when one of her old beaus makes what she at first believes to be a sincere marriage proposal, only to withdraw it when he begins to suspect, incorrectly, that she is no longer wealthy. Fanny is left alone with her maid, Manby (Dorothy Peterson). Fanny's cousin George brings Job back to her home unannounced. He explains that the Nazis have left Job penniless and "worse", and calls on Fanny to be generous. Her vanity almost prevents her from venturing down her home's grand staircase to greet Job. When she does finally enter the parlor, Job moves toward her, stumbles, and falls; he is blind following internment in a concentration camp. Fanny rushes to cradle him. As she takes his arm and guides him up the staircase, she tells the maid that "Mr. Skeffington has come home". Long ago, Job had told Fanny that "a woman is beautiful when she's loved, and only then". George tells Fanny that, at that moment, she has "never been more beautiful". At long last, she realizes the truth of it.