The Lost Weekend is about Don Burnam, a writer who hasn’t found the success in life that he craves. After selling a story to a major magazine he decided to drop out of college but the decision proved poor as he never achieved what he was hoping for after that magazine story. Don is an alcoholic and as the movie The Lost Weekend begins he’s been sober for ten days and is feeling good. It doesn’t take long for things to go bad though. Instead of spending a long weekend in the country with his brother Wick he manages to miss the train and instead he spends four days getting drunk, reminiscing about the past, and spiraling downwards.

Don is broke but he takes the money meant for the cleaning lady and heads to the bar with it. He drinks and drinks, sharing stories with the bartender and as he talks we’re taken back in time to see how Don met his girlfriend Helen and how they fell in love. This happens throughout the movie as they tell the story of Don while letting us live it with him. Don’s binge continues throughout the weekend as we see the depths he will sink to in order to get a little money to pay for more alcohol.

His emotional toil is significant and it comes through in every frame of the film. At the end we the depth of it when Don pawns a coat he bought Helen so he can get a gun to end his life. Luckily for him Helen refuses to give up on the man she loves and she grabs the gun from his apartment and convinces him not to end his life. The film is masterfully made by the talented Billy Wilder and stars Ray Milland and Jane Wyman. In the end Don finds a way out of his drunken misery and manages to finally dedicate himself to writing a novel.