For Whom the Bell Tolls
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Movie Reviews of For Whom the Bell Tolls
Movie Review: Full screen - are you kidding me?
Summary: 4 Stars
I cannot believe this film is released on DVD in full screen format only, and not in a widescreen format. Full screen is fine for films that are primarily shot indoors, but to do this to a movie with such scenic grandeur is a crime. This format totally destroys the cinematography and grand vistas of the orignal. Have a heart and release a widescreen version!Movie Review: Very fine acting...but a flawed movie
Summary: 3 Stars
Review of DVD: This is a nicely restored version of the film, with reasonalbly good color (a bit contrasty sometimes), with good sound. DVD extras are adequate, but sparce by modern movie standards.
All the principles did give fine performances. While Katina Paxinou gives a fine, Oscar winning performance, I believe Akim Tamiroff as the undependable and annoying Pablo is the finest in the cast. But Pilar is a much more likable character.
Discussion of the movie: Cooper and Bergman are fine, independent of each other. But the romantic attraction did not seem believable to me, especially how quickly Bergman's character was smitten by Cooper's. Cooper looked, well, middle aged (he's about 42 here), when younger men were available (a rivalry might have added something here). Fortunately, while young, she doesn't look 19 (her character's age, she's about 28). Remember, her character is falling for Robert Jordan, not Gary Cooper, and any attraction built up in the book is not added in this adaptation. There was absolutely no suspense in what was going to happen between these two. For me, the romance story simply got in the way of action, and the Pablo/Pilar conflict. What was Pablo going to do? Can he be trusted?
Movie Review: Bergman Steals It
Summary: 3 Stars
Gary Cooper was a friend of Hemingway and pushed for a script faithful to the book. I must say, I'm pleasantly surprised to see that it is very close to the book plotline. All the characters are fleshed out. Ingrid Bergman played a Spanish girl raped by the fascists after they kill her parents. It's a meaty role, and you would think a blond Swede could never pull it off. Well you don't know young Bergman till you see her as Maria. What a beautiful young actress she was.
All the actors were good repeating Hem's short simple sentences, some of them rather formal in order to simulate a Spanish dialect. If we look back to the Americans that volunteered to fight Franco in 1937, you have to wonder what possessed them to leave their cushy jobs in academia or the arts to get into a bloodbath. Perhaps it was the appeal of Communism, which for so many Depression weary intellectuals looked attractive. The battle between the Republic backed by Stalin versus Franco backed by evil personified, Hitler, it seemed to be a crucible. The rest is pure American romanticism, which has its roots way back, before Huckleberry Finn.
Movie Review: Great Film: Not Deserving of "Full Screen" treatment
Summary: 3 Stars
Read all other reviews of this film for film's brilliance, Gary Cooper's performance, etc. . However, what is bothersome, as good a reproduction this film is, is that it's reproduced in Full Frame NOT theatrical format as when the film was released or widescreen which, particularly in the case of such a brilliant film as this, it is a cinematic crime not to release a true to intent vesion of any film as visualized/composed by the Director and cinematographer. I cannot understand companies that go to all the trouble to make a film like this transfer to DVD so well and overlook the obvious: showing the film's original parameters as well.There are other film's I refuse to purchase simply because of the destruction of the film's composition that Full Frame productions foist upon the artists who created such cinematic greats. Had a truer visual format been availableI would have purchased it, however, this is one exception that I had to buy because of the overall brilliance of the work. Here is hoping that the future will bring a even greater reproduction of the original intent of the film's entire LOOK.
Movie Review: "Any Man's death diminishes me"
Summary: 3 Stars
"Because I am involved in mankind;
and therefore send to know
for who the bell tolls.
It tolls for thee."
Spain 1937. Robert Jordan (Gary Cooper) came to Spain o fight for "The Republic" (a nice way to say for the commies) and against nationalists. He also had a dislike for Germans and Italians. His assignment was to go behind the nationalist lines and blow up a bridge at a strategic moment. There this stoic hero meets a peasant girl (a much too young for Gary, Ingrid Bergman) with a bad haircut and that barely escaped a train ride. They naturally fall in love which complicates things. Will this jeopardize the mission? Do we care?
Along with this we have the classic mixture of characters that you cannot tell if they are the good guys or the bad guys. The two that stand out besides the hero and his girl are Katina Paxinou (sort of a female Antony Quinn) as the doyenne, and Akim Tamiroff as the once good guerilla who may be bad or just self-centered. Who they were and how the acted was quite a predicable formula.