FeistyUpper If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

Teringer An Exercise In Nonsense

RipDelight This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

Deanna There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

khartoum-39722 Screenplay based on a novel by John O'Hara in 1958. One of a dozen films Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward did as husband and wife. They stayed married until Newman died in 2008. The film cost $3 million and grossed $5 million. So it was major deal in those days but was not a runaway success. There was quite a lot of adult content for the time which was surprising. It was certainly apt for the time but all the concern about divorce makes it a period piece but an accurate period piece. I find all the filming on sets restrictive as I am spoiled by modern location and outdoor shooting. Although it is certainly not a great work. Will give it a solid 7. RECOMMEND

George Redding In this story from 20th Century Fox about a young man returning from his tour of duty after WWII and then working to climb to the top of the ladder with a top New York business firm, Paul Newman, his wife Joanne Woodward, and Ina Balin seem to perform great acting feats. In a sentence, the story is about, again, an ex-soldier, David Alfred Eaton, trying to make it to the top in the business world, but is mistreated by his boisterous, arrogant father Samuel Eaton (and Leon Ames does a good acting job here in that role) and has a rocky marriage with his sometimes hostile wife, (played by his real-life wife Joanne Woodward,)and then finds warm love in the young lady Natalie Benzinger, played by Balin. The time setting is from 1946 to the early '50's, and NYC has that look in the movie. Myrna Loy does a good acting job as Martha Eaton, David's drunk mother. In the story, while David Eaton is, again, at odds with his wife, and simultaneously does find warmth and love in another woman, you're lead to believe that while infidelity is not to be defended, neither is hostility in marriage. It does end on a warm note, and the cast lends much to it being a great dramatic feat.

robert-temple-1 This film, based upon a best-selling novel of the period by John O'Hara, is a savage attack on the materialistic imperatives of American society. Paul Newman stars as the young heir to a steel mill in Pennsylvania who does not want to take on the running of Daddy's business, but wants to shape his own independent life. So far so good. But it turns out that what he really wants is to get richer than Daddy. Big mistake. He falls for a wholly materialistic and self-centred beauty played by Joanne Woodward (as most people know, Newman's wife in real life, if there is any real life outside movies, that is). There is the usual struggle against the horrified parents, who are richer than Newman's father because they are part of 'the Dupont set' in Delaware. Newman's sperm accomplish what his charm could not, and persuade the parents of Woodward that as she is pregnant, they had better accept 'a poor boy', i.e. someone who is only moderately rich, as a son-in-law after all. So stratified is the American social hierarchy! John O'Hara knew what he was talking about, being from Pennsylvania, when he told his popular tales of what goes on there, and in neighbouring Delaware. The marriage falls apart and Woodward is serially unfaithful but Newman puts up with it in return for earning a partnership in a large financial firm which will make him richer than Daddy at last. He meets the archetypal good girl, played sympathetically by Ina Balin (an actress who was later to die prematurely at 52), but he even turns his back on her and on True Love for money. Can he save his soul? Can he say no to money and yes to love? Can he redeem himself? I dare not tell. But this is a very effective melodrama, excellently directed by Mark Robson, and well worth watching. And oh yes I almost did not mention that Newman's mother, a hopeless alcoholic, is magnificently played by Myrna Loy, and although she only appears in the early part of the film, it is worth seeing just for her alone. This is a good 'un.

Bowserb46 This is one of those movies that I can't pass up when it shows up on cable. I grew up in the 50's and 60's, so movies like this are also a bit of time travel. This time it was TCM. Saw it coming up and had to use the DVR.It is not easy to make a novel into a movie. An average novel would require eight to ten hours of movie--so a mini series is the least. A childhood to maturity novel must be a real challenge. In this case, selecting just a portion of the novel and writing a screenplay around it, in my opinion, worked nicely. Here's what I like about it.Joanne Woodward and Paul Newman. They do good work separately and extraordinary work together. Woodward is believable, especially playing a southerner (which she is not here), but also playing a member of high society in New England. Paul Newman is just a good and versatile actor. The story moves slowly, but not too slowly, and the characters have enough interest to be savored in the quiet moments. Scenes with the early 1950's cars in the forest. Elmer Bernstein's score. The scene where the Eatons meet Natalie in New York. Mary Eaton is wearing a tiara (crown?). The king and queen meeting the king's courtesan. Mary, afterward: "She calls me Mrs. Eaton. You call her Natalie, but she doesn't call you anything."Don't like. Glaring hole in the story. What happened to Eaton Steel and Martha Eaton. Big family owned business and only an alcoholic widow left, and Alfred just goes off to make airplanes? Clearly Samuel Eaton was a hands on manager. Did a middle manager pop in on Mrs. Eaton and say, "I'll take care of the company for you. Don't you worry. Just get a board resolution appointing me as CEO." Or did Alfred shut down the plant in his father's honor and to spite the striking union, with his mother just living off accumulated wealth?And I wonder. Compare the last half of this movie with the AMC TV series "Mad Men", which starts out set at about the same time that this movie is set. Imagine MacHardie coming in to the Sterling Cooper conference room. Compare the morals and mores of Terrace with those of Mad Men. Considering that they were written in times 40 years apart, they fit surprisingly well, don't they?