Nayan Gough
A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.
Aneesa Wardle
The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.
Kaydan Christian
A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.
trimmerb1234
USA/French co-productions are a rarity. But this serves its subject matter superbly well - that time when American soldiers in their hundreds of thousands were first fighters then feted liberators on French soil. As does the script - nobody is a stereotype, everyone has their own, believable, character. Perhaps the sense of authenticity came also from the short time, just 8 years, between the events portrayed and when it was filmed. This was not one author's or one scriptwriter's imagination - it must have been a vivid memory in the minds of tens if not hundreds of thousands of American soldiers. Equally vivid for the French who had seen occupation or collaboration then liberation. There is a certain graciousness and humanity in the treatment of the characters. Later and lesser writers and directors would portray such situations as simply the meeting of drunken animalistic soldiers with faceless whores and thieving tricky locals. There is a dignity and respect to this film which has all but disappeared in subsequent "war movies".Star that he is, was Kirk Douglas well-cast? I think not. Kirk Douglas portrayed even personified a particular type: given to action either outer or inner. Here he plays a far less certain character, not driven but drifting. Douglas was always Spartacus, even if the Romans couldn't spot him, viewers could every time. Perhaps this was a role for Mitchum - a mixture of integrity tempered by a degree of indolence.This is not a film packed with stars, it is packed with people, American and French - a tribute to the director, writers and cast.(British viewers might recognise a familiar face - Leslie Dwyer (here a quirky cameo Tommy with "just 5 teeth") later the grumpy child-hating children's entertainer in a '80's TV comedy series Hi De Hi!.)
Nicholas Rhodes
I discovered this one on French Television yesterday as the last of a series of Anatole Litvak films. I've probably been over-generous by giving it a 9 but admit to having some strange criteria for my annotations. It is an American film made on location in the city of Paris ( as opposed to being made in a studio ). And this is the Paris of the golden romantic age of the 1950's, not the ugly one of today - there's no comparison between the two. In addition to this we have lavish helpings of accordion playing Michel Emer's "Le Disque Usé" ( Tant qu'il y a la vie, il y a de l'espoir ....), a beautiful song made famous by Edith Piaf many years ago and indeed difficult to find on CD in an ordinary instrumental version...as they say in French .."quand j'entends cet air, je craque ....." ! Another unexpected jewel in the film was a glimpse, albeit short, of my favourite area of Paris - old Belleville and the Rue Vilin Staircase. Whilst most of the film is made in central Paris with views of the Seine etc, at one stage, Kirk Douglas is hiding out from the army authorities down a staircase. This is the famous "Escalier de la Rue Vilin" and there are various views from top and bottom of this staircase. It is exactly the same place as is used in the film 'The Red Balloon", "Les Jeux Dangereux", "Casque d'Or", " Du Rififi chez Les Hommes " and "Le Doulos". I have a book all about this area and apparently another American film was made there called "Gigot, clochard de Bellville" made by Gene Kelly and starring Jackie Gleeson as a mute. As you may imagine, there's more chance of an elephant passing through the eye of a needle than of finding that film anywhere in the world. To return to Act of Love, this is a sort of French "Waterloo Bridge", it starts out in Villefranche Sur Mer on the Côte D'Azur and flashes back to Paris in 1945. The same Michel Emer tune is heard both now and then. Kirk Douglas, as handsome as ever, wishes to stay in one particular room in a hotel, and a flashback indicates why. It is the same technique as in Waterloo Bridge with Robert Taylor and Vivien Leigh. At the same time he meets another American tourist who seems to recognize him by who he himself does not recognize. The flashback helps us on this one too. At the end of the film, all fits into place but you have that same sickening and lugubrious feeling you had at the end of Waterloo Bridge. Plot-wise, the film is a little slow to get off the ground, and the love affair between Kirk Douglas and Dany RObin takes time to gather steal. That is my principal criticism. Also we see Serge Reggiani in a very aggressive role which annoyed me no end ! I didn't like the man at the best of times but in this film he was frankly a pain in the neck ! No doubt the film is unavailable anywhere on DVD - but I am at least glad to have a taped copy and will keep an eye out for any future issue. Missed "rendez-vous", be they in Act of Love, Waterloo Bridge or even Charles Boyer's "Back Street" are very difficult for me to bear whilst watching a film and leave an everlasting and indelible memory within me. The film is definitely to be recommended for nostalgics of old Paris, Kirk Douglas fans, and rare gems from the 1950's.
wuxmup
A low-key film with a fine cast. Unfortunately, it's so low-key as to seem nearly aimless for the first half. The pace and interest do pick up, however, toward the end.As World war II grinds slowly to a halt in Europe, an innocent French girl on the brink of prostitution and a cynical but lonely GI fall in love in the City of Lights - where, due to the war, the lights don't always work, A flaw, at least as the film plays on television, is that the French accents are sometimes hard to understand. And there are plenty of them.Though ten years too old for the role, not unusual for actors in war movies before the '70s, Douglas turns in a solid performance as Pfc. Teller, the wounded American soldier now stationed at an army headquarters in Paris. But it is the lovely Dany Robin, rarely seen in America, who deserves most of the acting credit for keeping the rather unfocused story interesting. Fernand Ledoux is adequately brooding and resentful. The eighteen-year-old Brigitte Bardot is already beautiful, but look sharp or you may miss her.The real scene-stealer here, though, is the slinky Barbara Laage, who shows herself to be a fine actress in very nearly her only American film. Too bad she breezes out of the picture a third of the way through.The on-location shots of Paris are also a plus in a film that sometimes flirts dangerously with soap opera. Not a classic or even a forgotten classic, but worth your time if bittersweet love is your cup of tea.
gerritschroder
More than any other movie I've seen, this one draws a dark picture of what the statistical enormity and bureaucratic obscenity of WWII did to individuals during (and after) the Second World War. This is a love story set against the new way of dealing with the logistics of millions of people on the move in wartime Europe -- on either side. The big point is that it's difficult to draw a line between the sides in the brutal impersonality of the events that crush people like the characters in this story.Kirk Douglas is great, of course, and the direction in the film is always intersting. Hard to believe this was made as late as 53.
See this if you can -- I saw it on TCM recently in a Kirk Douglas festival. For that matter, watch all the Kirk Douglas flicks you can -- the guy had either great taste or great luck.
