NR | 1h 45m | Drama, Romance, War | 1946
As an Army veteran, I’ve heard quite a few tales from World War II vets, mostly in the waiting rooms of the VA, where time moves slower than a government form in triplicate. I’d often wonder what it must’ve been like to come home after years overseas: how they adjusted, what they carried with them, and what they left behind.
Then I stumbled upon a lesser-known film with a similar premise and a more modest delivery: “Till the End of Time.” It doesn’t have the recognition of “Best Years,” but it hits some of the same nerves, but in a quieter, scrappier way.
A postwar drama with Robert Mitchum? Count me in. Mitchum’s the kind of actor who could lean against a wall and make it look like a major plot development. While the movie isn’t exactly a five-star general in the cinematic ranks, it’s an earnest foot soldier trying to hold its ground.
Released just a few months before “Best Years,” this RKO melodrama wades into similar territory. A soldier deals with readjustment, disillusionment, and the deep scars left behind by war, both visible and invisible. The film is stitched together with a modest budget, some patchy writing, and a lot of heart.
Guy Madison stars as Cliff Harper, a clean-cut Marine fresh from the Pacific. He returns home to Los Angeles only to find his parents more focused on pushing him into life’s next chapter than pausing to understand the one he just barely survived. They’ve already penciled him into a future filled with suits and steady paychecks, never mind that the war has left him dazed, drifting, and more than a little emotionally frostbitten.
Harper meets Pat Ruscomb (Dorothy McGuire), a lonely war widow clinging to the memory of her late husband with one hand and to Harper with the other. Madison, as charming as a recruiting poster, struggles to emote much beyond mildly perturbed, but he’s clearly trying. McGuire gives us a layered portrait of grief, guilt, and tentative hope; however, the script saddles her with some laughably forward dialogue and a few moments that toe the line between sensual and soap opera.
Then there’s Mitchum, playing William Tabeshaw, a gruff-yet-golden-hearted Marine with a metal plate lodged in his head. He dreams of owning a ranch in New Mexico. Mitchum, effortlessly cool even with war injuries and existential dread, practically sleepwalks through the film and still ends up stealing every scene he’s in.
Perry Kincheloe (Bill Williams), a double amputee and former boxer, has lost not just his legs but also his sense of purpose.
These three form a makeshift brotherhood, united more by trauma than triumph. Their barroom banter, and eventual barroom brawl with some belligerents, offers the film’s few moments of real electricity.
One surprisingly gripping scene involves a veteran suffering from what we’d now recognize as PTSD. He trembles with “battle fatigue”; he’s afraid to go home and afraid of the shame. It’s a jarring, affecting moment that cuts through the otherwise sappy melodrama like shrapnel—if only the movie had more of that emotional honesty. Instead, it keeps veering into love-riangle territory.
On the lighter side, Jean Porter brings much-needed zing to the film as Helen, Harper’s flirty girl-next-door. She’s everything Pat isn’t—young, vibrant, and completely uninterested in mourning.
“Till the End of Time” isn’t the powerhouse that “Best Years” was. It’s messier, more sentimental, and occasionally veers into the hokey. But for all its uneven moments, it has a quiet sincerity that sneaks up on you.
It deserves credit for daring to wade into the psychological murk of postwar America, especially now when so many films are more invested in selling spectacle than truth.
