Despite an outdated plot, about female sacrifice and an approach to mental health that is out of the question nowadays, this film portrays some famous actors like Katherine Hepburn (in the beginning of her cinematic career) and John Barrymore with their usual impeccable acting.
A middle-aged English woman Margaret, who is the mother of a young woman called Sidney, is about to remarry. Margaret’s first husband was called Hilary and he had been in a mental hospital for 15 years, reportedly due to shell shock in World War 1. Sidney has barely known her father and she is also engaged. They both lived well despite Hilary’s absence, however his sister also lived in the same house and she had the hope that someday he would eventually leave the hospital even though it did not seem likely.
At Christmas time the family received the news that Hilary disappeared and he returned to his old house immediately. At first, he met his daughter all grown up and could not recognize her. After she introduced herself both got along right away but had a heated argument in the next minute, which portrayed them as sensitive and emotionally voluble people. However, Hilary expected everything to be as it used to be even though Margaret had got to divorce him while he was in the mental hospital, but he was not aware of it yet.
In the middle of this mess Sidney was accidentally told that mental illness run in her family, which mad her worry if she would ever have the same symptoms as her father’s and if it could impact her prospective children, after all, she had plans to have many children with her fiance after they get married.
After a while, Hilary realized that Margaret was about to remarry and he begged her to reconsider her decision. Although Margaret truly loved her fiance and no longer had any feeling for Hilary, she felt she had a kind of social obligation to remain with her first husband in addition to pity him. But Sidney considered it was morally wrong her mother to give up marrying the woman she loved just because her father reappeared.
In order to convince her parents to carry on with their lives separately, Sidney broke up her own engagement even though she was about to marry the love of her life. She could not make her love bear the burden of having to deal with a future wife and children who would possibly have mental disease. Although he told Sidney that he didn’t mind it and would like to marry her anyway, Sidney was adamant.
After her broke up, Sidney convinced Margaret to travel with her future husband and start a new life with him. In exchange, Sidney would live with her father, never marry and take care of him until the last day of his life because “they both had the same blood”. Margaret did not find it right her daughter to make such big sacrifice, but she was eventually persuaded to marry her love. Sidney also succeeded convincing Hilary that it was for the best he let Margaret go without hard feelings. At the end of film, it was just Hilary and Sidney at home and they both eventually got along well while Sidney loyally remained with her father.
As it was said in the beginning, the plot is terribly out of date, but the cast acted well and the film has a relaxed, slow pace typical of classic films of it’s era and therefore it is well-worth watching.
Silent Beauties 
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