The two superb British films now revived at the Kenmore, though entirely different in subject matter, are amazingly similar in form and background. Both are told mainly by the method of flashback, one from the psychiatrist's couch and the other from a drawing-room reverie. Both have a musical accompaniment of late Romantic period music which is always insistent and always heavy.

In "The Seventh Veil," Ann Todd portrays a concert pianist who, after a long period of intense training by her cousin-guardian Nicholas (James Mason), succumbs to a neurotic illness. Miss Todd manages to put across many different ages, moods, and attitudes smoothly; she can shift from the coquettish to the depressed with no difficulty, and uses both facial and bodily movement to advantage. Mason is as gutturally crisp as ever, and avoids over-suppressing his emotions, which is a common fault in such cynical roles.

Whereas "The Seventh Veil" treats the introduction of conflict into an abnormal situation, Noel Coward's "Brief Encounter" is a story of the disruption of a middle-class housewife's prosaic routine when she meets an equally prosaic doctor while on her weekly shopping trip. Here the flashbacks are less adroitly handled than in "The Seventh Veil," and the performance of Trevor Howard, as the doctor, is too enthusiastic for the setting. Celia Johnson, however, gives an excellent performance as the wife. Though she is on the screen for almost the entire action, she manages to maintain an atmosphere of suspense and indecision without letting down and without becoming maudlin.