A fairly typical 50s Hollywood blockbuster... sex, significance, stars, best seller origins, the war. The three stars are great - Monty Clift in full nervy post accident anxiousness, looking like he's going to have a breakdown; Brando, lingering over his German accent; Dean Martin, getting by on simply being really well cast.
It's very long. Far too long. But interesting because of the leads.
Most of the film consists of two handers - Brando and Max Schell, Martin and Barbara Rush (best performance of hers I've seen, very polished), Martin and Clift, Clift and Hope Lange. A lot of the story consists of Clift being beaten up by his fellow soldiers in a masochistic way. The anti Semitism of the time is effectively conveyed - with a look at the camps, and the anti Semitism in the American army.
Dean Martin is far better cast than Tony Randall would have been, incidentally.
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