The Pride and the Passion

It's 1810 and the Spanish are retreating from Napoleon's French army battered and beaten; they ditch a mammoth, cumbersome cannon over a cliff, but an English Captain, also against Napoleon, helps resurrect it to defeat the French battalions. Stanley Kramer directed this failed epic visualization of C.S. Forester's book "The Gun", complete with miscast stars and a one-sided view of history (it's no doubt the French weren't crazy about this picture--it makes them look like heartless monsters picking on defenseless saints). Cary Grant's Brit is the subject of some levity (which is welcomed), but Frank Sinatra's Spanish fighter is taken very seriously (which was a mistake). Heavily pancaked and talking like an educated bandito, Sinatra looks and sounds ridiculous (one has to wonder: did Kramer pick Sinatra for this role or was the actor foisted upon him by United Artists?). Sophia Loren, as a Spanish girl who falls for both men, doesn't attempt an accent, but her Flamenco is as unreal as her red-tinted hair; she smiles a bit in the beginning but is otherwise quite dour, and Grant doesn't even seem to notice her until the script calls for him to fall in love. Some of the landscapes are attractive, the castles and churches are impressively photographed by the great Franz Planer, but the studio-bound melodrama and the outdoor battle scenes are an erratic mix, both visually and emotionally. For those who stick with it, the finale is surprisingly sensitive. ** from ****