256. From Here To Eternity (1953)

Directed by Fred Zinnemann

Synopsis

A bugler gets transferred to a place in Hawaii, not long before Pear Harbor, he was once a quite good middleweight boxer and his commanding officer wants him to box for the team, he refuses, they make his life miserable. He has a buddy in Frank Sinatra, and develops a friendship with Burt Lancaster, his Sergeant, who is dating the Captain's wife. The boxer (Montgomery Clift) falls in love with a prozzie at the local prozzie bar. Frank Sinatra dies in the stockades being abused by Ernest Borgnine, Clift kills Borgnine in a knife fight. Pearl Harbor happens, Clift gets killed trying to sneak back into the army camp, Burt Lancaster doesn't get the girl as well...

Review

This was a good film, it wasn't rushed, it took its sweet time to come to the big event, and in the process did a great job in developing a rapport between the audience and the characters.

This is a star-studded cast indeed, and they all act to the best of their abilities, with the possible exception of Deborah Kerr, who could have been better here, but presents us with one of the most iconic scenes in the history of cinema, so she is forgiven.

If you watch this film out of historical context it is hard to see how significantly modern it is for its time, the boozing, the prostitutes, the violence, the sex, it is all a little notch up from previous films, one of the good things about watching these films in chronological order is the opportunity of seeing these little differences in mores. A great film.

Final Grade

9/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

Legend has it that Frank Sinatra got the role in the movie because of his alleged Mafia connections, and that this was the basis for a similar subplot in The Godfather, although, this has been dismissed on several occasions by the cast and crew of the film. Director Fred Zinneman commented that "The legend about a horse's head having been cut off is pure invention, a poetic license on the part of Mario Puzo who wrote The Godfather." More plausible is the notion that Sinatra's then-wife Ava Gardner persuaded studio head Harry Cohn's wife to use her influence with him; this version is related by Kitty Kelley in her Sinatra biography. Sinatra himself had been bombarding Cohn with letters and telegrams asking to play the ill-fated Maggio, even signing some of the letters "Maggio". Sinatra benefited when Eli Wallach, who was originally cast as Maggio, dropped out to appear on Broadway instead. However, he was paid only $8,000, a huge drop from his $130,000 salary for Anchors Aweigh.

Most famous scene from the film: