Cubussoli Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

Lovesusti The Worst Film Ever

Maidexpl Entertaining from beginning to end, it maintains the spirit of the franchise while establishing it's own seal with a fun cast

Kien Navarro Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Ed Uyeshima Set in the Australian outback In the 1920's, this forgotten 1960 saga is one of those films that has not quite gained a cult following but still provides delights upon discovery. At first glance, it feels like it will be a Disney live-action adventure along the lines of "Swiss Family Robinson", but director Fred Zinnemann (just coming off his acclaimed "The Nun's Story") presents a more complex dynamic around the Carmodys, an itinerant Irish-Australian family of three who travels from town to town picking up whatever work they can find (thus the film's title), usually driving large herds of sheep from one station to another. Paddy is the ostensible head of one such "sundowner" family, a proud man who enjoys being rootless. His steadfast wife Ida and dutiful son Sean, however, have grown tired of the constant movement and want to buy a farm so they can settle down. After picking up refined, jack-of-all- trades Englishman Rupert Venneker as an extra drover and surviving a life-threatening brush fire, Ida convinces Paddy to take a job at a station shearing sheep where she becomes the cook, Rupert a wool roller, and Sean as a tar boy. As Ida collects their earnings in a Mason jar, Paddy starts to get feelings of wanderlust again, and the inevitable family struggle occurs.Now throw in an unaided baby delivery, a sheep-shearing contest, and a horse race, and you get the idea of what goes on in this episodic story which manages to be constantly engaging despite the lack of real conflict in the story. A lot of the credit belongs to the two stars reunited from their previous vehicle, John Huston's "Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison" (1957). Speaking with a convincing Aussie accent, Robert Mitchum manages to exude his particular brand of machismo without losing his humility as Paddy. Deborah Kerr makes plainspoken Ida a tower of tolerance and still holds her own with clear authority. Together they generate a sexy and honest rapport that gives the movie its beating heart and makes the concessions each character make for the other believable. A solid cast provides able support including Peter Ustinov as the erudite Rupert, Glynis Johns (later Mrs. Banks in "Mary Poppins") as a feisty bar owner who captures Rupert's heart, and Michael Anderson Jr. as too-good-to-be-true Sean. The economical screenplay is credited to Isobel Lennart ("Funny Girl") but was mostly penned by the author of the source novel, Jon Cleary. David Lean's favorite cinematographer Jack Hildyard ("The Bridge on the River Kwai") does an impressive job capturing the barren outback in all its sunbaked beauty.

wendellfountain I first saw this movie about 40 years ago, and was taken aback by a different Robert Mitchum than I had come to admire over the years. Though it may be trivial, I thought Robert Mitchum should have had top billing, not Deborah Kerr, but from what little I know about Mitchum, he didn't care in the least. I have admired and respected Deborah Kerr over the years, but Robert Mitchum was very overpowering as Paddy. This story about an Australian son, friend (Peter Ustinov), and the Carmody couple, Ide and Paddy, in a nomadic setting is very powerful. The director and producer of this film did a fine job of getting some of the wildlife on film indigenous to Australia. Though it was not a violent movie so often associated with Robert Mitchums' characters, it did contain a lot of action and ups and downs of life in the real world, which is experienced by most of us. Though a rather lengthy film, it was one in which I wanted to see more about the Carmody family of the 1920s. Great film, great acting, and wonderful filming.

MartinHafer I would love to sit and watch this film with an Aussie. That's because as an American, I don't know enough to know how accurate this movie is--and if the accents of all the non-Australians in the leads are even close to being correct.This film is about a family of migrant workers--not a lazy 'sundowner' (see the IMDb trivia for more on this). They travel across Australia driving and shearing sheep to make a few quid--always on the move and no permanent home of their own. As for the husband (Robert Mitchum), he loves this sort of life with few responsibilities. But the wife (Deborah Kerr) is getting tired and sees a need to settle down and finally have a house of their own--especially since their son is getting older and wants some permanence in his life. The vast majority of the film, though, is almost like a documentary--showing what the life is like--like you get a little window into their migrant ways.This is a well made film. The acting, direction and music are all quite nice. My only serious qualm is that the film is slow and I know many folks simply wouldn't sit still for such a seemingly mundane plot. But, if you are patient, it's well worth your time.

Nazi_Fighter_David Frequently slow, solemn and simplistic, the films of Fred Zinneman are the work of a director who appears to have equated artistry with neatness, objectivity with aloofness, and significance with decorative, humorless reverence… "The Sundowners" was perhaps the best 'Australian' film made up to that time, and was, incidentally, a perceptive study of a marriage: Deborah Kerr was the wife who wanted to settle down, and Robert Mitchum the husband who didn't… It reveals much about their life-style and the land in which they live… Their good teenaged son Sean (Michael Anderson Jr.) explains the meaning of a sundowner as someone whose home is wherever he happens to be when the sun goes down…So Paddy (Mitchum) and Ida (Kerr) are a warm and well-adjusted couple with one grown son, except for one argument—the struggle between his love of being a wanderer and her fundamental desire for the stability of a home… Paddy was a man who couldn't settle in one place… For him, most places were fit only for arrivals and departures… The film—which constantly endeavored to show the Australian woman's compassion for the problems of women in a big male society—is also a happy celebration with other notable participants being Glynis Johns as an awfully pleasant barmaid-innkeeper who loves men's company and knows how to deal with them; Peter Ustinov as an educated but slightly mysterious Englishman, a likable drifter, a kind of an elderly turtle who wears a nautical cap, with wealth of experience, but not much of a mind to make use of it…This turtle signs on as a drover with Paddy, apparently not so much for a job but for something to pass the time… Outstanding is a scene in which Ida, as a woman with no makeup, sitting on the wagon, spots in the window of a stationary train a well-dressed woman who obviously has all the things she doesn't... They look at each other for an instance as the rich woman applies powder to her face… Ida gently lifts her fingers over her cheeks… They stare at each other and we rapidly notice Ida's thoughts…"The Sundowners" is one of the very best of Mitchum's films… In the pub sequence, he is at his best when he sings "Botany Bay" and "Lime Juice Tub." Deborah Kerr gave the role both a touch of delicacy and a touch of sensuality… She wins, for her impressive performance, her sixth and last Oscar nomination… The motion picture, splendidly photographed in Technicolor and with a nice atmospheric music, contains fires in the dry forests, shearing contests, fist-fights, the Aussie's love of beer, a game of two-up, a big race meeting, much of the beautiful Australian landscape and the life on sheep farming stations