Fox had a big hit telling the story of D Day in The Longest Day - this is more a romantic drama bookended by the D-Day attack.
Robert Taylor and Richard Todd are soldiers taking part in the invasion. Taylor loves Dana Wynter. They're not much of a couple. He's married, she's posh, her dad is John Williams. Taylor liked this because it was reminiscent of Waterloo Bridge but that had more point because she was a streetwalker. It's really hard to care. Wynter is sort of with Richard Todd (barely in the film) who goes off and vanishes for a few years, she starts a fling with married Taylor, whose wife we never see, then Todd comes back injured and he's all noble about it, Wynter's dad kills himself out of feeling useless, then D Day happens and Taylor is injured and Todd walks on a mine and dies, and then back in England Wynter doesn't tell Taylor Todd has died so Taylor can go back to his wife. I think that's meant to be noble but it's hard to care. All the sympathy goes to Todd, who is brave, does a lot of fighting and dies.
Wynter is very beautiful and classy, Taylor is craggy handsome sucking down those ciggies. Edmond O'Brien is blustering and chubby as an officer who blabs about D Day to a journo and is traumatised by the Dieppe Raid (this was based on a book by a Canadian, apparently)... who is more interesting than any of the leads.
It's a weird movie, never seems to quite get it's tone right. Todd and Taylor should have been friends, Wynter and Todd should've been married. For a film with a high death toll set in wartime made by veterans there's little life to it.
No comments:
Post a Comment