A fast-talking traveling salesman with a charming, loquacious manner convinces a sincere evangelist that he can be an effective preacher for her cause.A fast-talking traveling salesman with a charming, loquacious manner convinces a sincere evangelist that he can be an effective preacher for her cause.A fast-talking traveling salesman with a charming, loquacious manner convinces a sincere evangelist that he can be an effective preacher for her cause.
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Edward Andrews
- George F. Babbittas George F. Babbitt
- (as Ed Andrews)
Larry J. Blake
- Mac - Bartenderas Mac - Bartender
- (uncredited)
Phil Bloom
- Cornermanas Cornerman
- (uncredited)
Elmer Gantry is a fast-talking, hard-drinking traveling salesman who always has a risqué story and a hip flask to entertain cronies and customers alike. He is immediately taken with Sister Sharon Falconer, a lay preacher whose hellfire-and-damnation revivalism has attracted quite a following. Gantry uses his own quick wit and Bible knowledge to become an indispensable part of Sister Sharon's roadshow, but his past soon catches up with him in the form of Lulu Bains, now a prostitute. While Gantry seeks and eventually gets forgiveness from Sharon, tragedy strikes when she finally manages to get out of her revivalist tent and opens a permanent church. —garykmcd
Top review
A Much Better Than Average Literary Adaption
For some reason Richard Brooks seemed to think of himself as the man best suited to turning great novels and plays into films, but if the results were at best entertaining ("The Brothers Karamazov", "Cat on a hot tin roof") they tended to fall far short of the originals. If "Elmer Gantry" worked better than most was largely due to Brooks ability to tell a rattling good yarn at a cracking pace and to the performances of a superb cast.
Burt Lancaster seemed born to play the role of the lustful traveling salesman whose desire for the Aimee Semple McPhearson-like Sister Sharon turns him into a charismatic preacher, (his performance here is a virtual reprise of his performance as Starbuck in "The Rainmaker" a few years earlier). As Sharon, Jean Simmons gives a luminous performance, all fragility and repressed sexuality and singer Shirley Jones is a revelation as a trampy prostitute; (both she and Lancaster were rewarded with Oscars). Not great then, but several cuts above what it might have been.
Burt Lancaster seemed born to play the role of the lustful traveling salesman whose desire for the Aimee Semple McPhearson-like Sister Sharon turns him into a charismatic preacher, (his performance here is a virtual reprise of his performance as Starbuck in "The Rainmaker" a few years earlier). As Sharon, Jean Simmons gives a luminous performance, all fragility and repressed sexuality and singer Shirley Jones is a revelation as a trampy prostitute; (both she and Lancaster were rewarded with Oscars). Not great then, but several cuts above what it might have been.
helpful•329
- MOscarbradley
- Mar 20, 2005
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Is Elmer Gantry (1960) known by a different name in India in English? If yes, what is it known as?
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