Imdb Ranking 7.4
A Robert Mitchum and Trevor Howard movie directed by David Lean and written by Robert Bolt with the Irish Rebellion of 1916 as a backdrop seemed like it couldn’t miss.
Robert Mitchum plays a school teacher who likes to press flowers and Sara Miles plays his young wife who likes real flowers better. And that is the basic story line. Charles is content with the comfortable, peaceful life that they are living while Rosy is looking for something more adventurous. When a wounded. young British officer is transferred to their quiet town, the seeds of their downfall are sown.br>
The rest of the movie is a soap opera that leaves you wondering why Charles puts up with the nonsense going on. You kind of wish one of Mitchum’s noir characters would come out of the shadows and take care of the British major and his spoiled little wife. Then we would have something
Instead we are left with a three hour love story in which we don’t sympathize with the tragic young lovers. John Mills, who won an Oscar playing the village idiot, is a distraction who looks like he belongs in a Monty Python movie. The music, which is beautiful, is horrendous as a backdrop for this movie. There are marching tunes, reminiscent of Fellini, being played at dramatic or romantic moments that seemed totally out of place
Having said all that, I have to admit I did like the movie. It was three hours long and I was never bored. There are a lot of interesting things going on outside the main story line. The Irish rebels getting arms from the Germans to fight the British, Ryan informing on the rebels and his daughter paying for it, and the views of the seaside and the village made the movie enjoyable.br>
It just could have been so much better.
