Plot Details: This opinion reveals major details about the movie's plot.

Forty-eight years ago Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, shortly before and after Japan bombed it December 7, 1941, had a jim-dandy of a movie made about it and trust me, its black and white nuances are still memorable while this year’s special effects monster Pearl Harbor with all its brilliant color will sink as surely and quickly as the Titanic did eighty years ago. The difference, besides the way they’re viewed and the years of their creation, is that Fred Zinnemann, who is rewarded with an Oscar for directing Best Picture From Here To Eternity, knew how to tell a compelling story with characters you can admire for their natural acting, bravery, passions defining them and attempts to not remain lonely.

If you’ve been put off this movie by the picture on the videotape of Burt Lancaster and a blond Deborah Kerr kissing on the beach, thinking this would just be a steamy sex film, then you have been a victim of false, or misleading, advertising. Know the saying that you can’t judge a book by its cover? You can’t judge this magnificent movie by that one kiss you’ve seen, either.

Let Me Convince You

There are three interweaving storylines here with a good amount of success. First is young Montgomery Clift who plays Pruitt, a new recruit, tremendous bugler and former middleweight boxer who stopped boxing after blinding someone. His contemptuous captain wants him to box again, but when “Pru” refuses, the captain and many of the other soldiers, demonstrate throughout the movie how very little they think of him unless he caves. Pru takes everything they hand him, though, and earns the respect and compassion of everyone in the audience. His tender, slow-starting romance with a brunette Donna Reed as well as his fervent loyalty to a garrulous Frank Sinatra, who he plays a poignant TAPS for, contribute to our escalating admiration. What happens to the “hothead,” as described by his sergeant-friend Warden brought to life by Lancaster, is best left for you to find out.

The second storyline involves Lancaster who has as much love for his and Pru’s captain as Pru does. He sees an opportunity to blow off his fury by taking up with the captain’s wife played by Kerr and their relationship is not the old-fashioned romance I alluded to in my title. No, that is reserved for Pru’s affair with Reed. Pru proposed marriage even, but when Kerr became too serious for Lancaster, demanding that he earn his officer stripes so she could divorce her loathsome husband, he wouldn’t do it. He did lead her on, it’s true, but still was eminently likable for his friendship with Pru.

The third major story followed Frank Sinatra’s character with the despicable Ernest Borgnine character. The two first meet at the club that Sinatra’s character Maggio brings his new loner-friend Pru to, where Reed works as a hostess. Borgnine is thumping the piano so Sinatra can’t hear the dance music (perhaps he would’ve broken out in song if he could’ve?) and annoyed, he requests that Borgnine stop making that noise. A fight almost ensues as he’s not phased to learn that Borgnine controls the Stockyard or army prison. Of course he seems determined to end up in there so he can spit in the face of “Fatso,” but the horrors that incur are left to our lively imaginations. :-)

What About The Bombing?

The bombing may be in black and white, but that doesn’t matter one bit. For the five minutes or so towards the end of the movie, the terror of the strike is just as real. The fires that erupt and nip at the plane-infested sky are no less lurid and frightening. When Lancaster’s men score a single direct hit, downing a Jap bomber, cheers not only are deafening to their ears, but also deafen for a few moments our pounding, patriotic hearts.

One victory is hardly enough, we know. The end of the movie is not far off now and how it changes the lives of its characters is starkly depicted with the ultimate price of integrity and courage. Even if Reed fibs a little to Kerr, we know as they both realize, too, that she is only giving an impulsive tribute to the man she loved. It was how we would want her to talk about hotheaded, yet endearing Pru.

My Recommendation

If eight Oscars and my review aren’t convincing enough, I suggest mangiotto’s brilliant review and James Jones’ National Book Award-winning novel that it’s based on. Jones spent time in Pearl Harbor before, during and after the bombing, so you know he is to be trusted with the story a heck of a lot more than today’s bastardizing Hollywood directors.

I loved everything about From Here To Eternity. The acting didn’t seem like acting to me, except some were better than others. Clift and Reed were probably my favorites because their storyline was more developed and touching than Lancaster and Kerr’s, but Sinatra and Borgnine were a powderkeg that you could expect to ignite and explode. It was as much tension and drunken frivolity as I imagined a pre-bombed Pearl Harbor to contain. Zinnemann directing this movie aptly paralleled more than light and dark, but the contrast of innocence and corruption, bravery and cowardice, love (of country and woman) and lust.

So now you know better than to believe advertising. Now you have an alternative to the cheap-shot-of-a-movie Pearl Harbor. And for a much nicer price!

Look also for more remarkable films by Zinnemann and books or novels by James Jones.

Recommended: Yes

Viewing Format: VHS
Video Occasion: Good Date Movie
Suitability For Children: Suitable for Children Age 13 and Older