Tomorrow Is Forever (1946)

At the end of WWI, a pregnant wife (Claudette Colbert) receives a telegram that her soldier husband (Orson Welles) has been killed in Europe. Jump 20 years later and she has remarried and her second husband (George Brent) is raising her son (Richard Long) as his own. But when an Austrian refugee (Orson Welles) comes to work for her husband, she begins to slowly suspect that he might be her first husband. Based on the novel by Gwen Bristow and directed by Irving Pichel (DESTINATION MOON). This is one corker of a tearjerker! Shamelessly intent on milking every tear it can from your ducts, you should resent it but when it's this determined, it's best to just give in! A suspension of belief is necessary to make the narrative work. When Orson Welles returns 20 years later, he is indubitably Orson Welles yet Colbert shows no signs of immediate recognition. That aside, it's a well done piece of melodrama. Max Steiner contributes one of his more restrained scores. With Richard Long, Lucile Watson, Joyce MacKenzie, Ian Wolfe and an adorable 7 year old Natalie Wood.