Anna Christie (1930)
Director:
Clarence Brown
Tagline:
« All Talking Picture »
Actors:
Anna
Matt
Chris
Marthy
Johnny, the Harp
Rating:
(3’860 votes)
(3’860 votes)
Quotes:
« Anna Christie: Gimme a whisky, ginger ale on the side, and don't be stingy, baby!
»
« Anna Christie: You was going on as if one of you had to own me. But, nobody owns me, see; excepting, myself. I'll do what I please and no man, I don't give a darn who he is, can tell me what to do. I haven't asked either of you for living. I'll make it myself, one way or another. I am my own boss. So, put that in your pipe and smoke it!
»
« Matt Burke: This queer, rough talk; not for a decent enough girl like yourself.
»
« Anna Christie: Decent! Who told you I was?
»
Runtime:89 minutes
Plots:
A young woman reunites with her estranged father and falls in love with a sailor, but struggles to tell them about her dark past.
In New York, the alcoholic skipper of a coal barge Chris Christofferson receives a letter from his estranged twenty year old daughter Anna “Christie” Christofferson telling that she will leave Minnesota to stay with him. Chris left Anna fifteen years ago to the countryside to be raised by relatives in a farm in St. Paul and he has never visited his daughter. Anna Christie arrives and she is a wounded woman with a hidden dishonorable past since she had worked for two years in a brothel to survive. She moves to the barge to live with her father and one night, Chris rescues the sailor Matt and two other fainted sailors from the sea. Soon Anna and Matt fall in love with each other and Anna has the best days of her life. But when Matt proposes to marry her, she is reluctant and also haunted by her past. Matt insists and Anna opens her heart to Matt and to her father disclosing the darks secrets of her past.
It has been 15 years since Chris has sent 5 year old Anna to live with relatives in St. Paul, and now she is coming back. Anna needs rest and a place to stay so Chris moves Marthy off his barge. One night, going down the coast, they rescue 3 survivors of a boat sinking. The big strong Scot, named Matt, takes a liking to Anna and they go to Coney Island when they get back to land. Matt decides that he will marry Anna but Chris says no – as does Anna. Every male member of Chris’s family has died at sea and Chris wants Anna to have children and a house on land. This causes friction between Chris and Matt so Anna sits them down and tells both of them the truth about her miserable life in Minnesota and the secret she has been carrying.
