steveo122
Here was Kramer's first chance to make a great motion picture and as a big classic-Hollywood-studio-epic-period-adventure he does a fine job: big, good looking, complicated crowd and action scenes.
But...(Confidential!)
The studio gave him Sinatra, who had no business being cast as a Spanish peasant and who only took the job (from a real actor) to be able to keep track of Ava Gardener while she was filming in Spain. In the meantime, Grant was distracted by heavy Sophia lust...(She says he never got any!)
If you like the stars, if you like old fashioned Hollywood, if you like Napoleonic adventures, it entertains.
ma-cortes
This spectacle movie is packed with noisy action , fights , uncomfortably cast , breathtaking Spanish outdoors and epic happenings . It deals with a small group of resistance fighters who form a vintage Spanish guerrilla led by an illiterate peasant called Miguel (Frank Sinatra who replaced Marlon Brando) battling for Spanish independence in 1810 and all of them must struggle a 6 ton cannon across the rugged terrain of Spain in order to help the British defeat the French commanded by General Jouvet (Theodore Bikel) . This enormous gun , perhaps the largest in the world at that time , to be destined to pull down the Avila walls . Meanwhile , along the way a British officer , named Anthony (Gary Grant who was utterly in love with Loren) joins the bunch , but then the protagonists have an affair and he falls in love for Juana (Sophia Loren in his first English-speaking role and she obtained $200,000 for her work on this big production) , the leader's sweetheart and the woman who get them both on fire . In this spectacular but silly flick there are epic events , battles , a love triangle , historical events and a cast of thousands . The flick describes the efforts , sacrifices and hardships to transport such a gigantic cannon throughout Spain and how it must be covered from the Bonaparte army . Based on a novel titled ¨The Gun¨ by CS Forester's about Napoleon's Iberian campaign in which Guerrilleros have to move a huge cannon chased by the Napoleonic forces . This is still a slog through an overlong , and tiring script by the prestigious Edward Anhalt ; however , the film results to be epic , thrilling , overwhelming and impressive , especially on Avila's final battle . Miscasting actors , specially of Frank Sinatra as a Spanish countryman hurt the movie . As Cary Grant and Frank Sinatra are a passable but uncomfortable duo , playing as two heroes struggling to lug a vast cannon within range of the Napoleonic wars , they considered themselves to be miscast in this film . Cary Grant had sworn never to make another historical film after the disastrous The Howards of Virginia (1940) , he made an exception for this film to star with other tower-box office actors as Sinatra and Loren . In fact , Sophia Loren got a great amount of money for her work in this big-budgeted super-production . This was one of two films Sophia Loren and Cary Grant starred in together , the other was Houseboat or Cintia (1958) by Melville Shavelson . As Sophia Loren is gorgeous as the rebellious girl providing the love interest on both , Grant and Sinatra . Support cast is frankly excellent , plenty of notorious Spanish secondaries as José Nieto , Carlos Casaravilla , Carlos Larrañaga , Xan Das Bolas , Emilio Rodríguez , Julian Ugarte , Barta Barri , Felix De Pomes , and Spanish ex-president Adolfo Suarez as extra and many others . Colorful cinematography in Technicolor by Franz Planer supported by Spanish cameraman Manuel Berenguer , being shot on location in Ciudad Encantada , Cuenca , Castilla-La Mancha , El Escorial's monastery , El Escorial, Madrid , Santiago de Compostela , A Coruña , Galicia , Segovia Roman Aqueduct , Segovia , Castilla y León, and Toledo and Valdemoro Madrid . Furthermore , it contains a rousing , evocative and sensitive musical score by George Antheil .This spectacularly solemn film and full of sound and fury was well produced/directed by Stanley Kramer but flopped in box office . By that time to be said that this producer Stanley Kramer himself wants really to pull down the Avila walls to make more realist the finale scenes . He was a successful filmmaker who had several hits , such as : Fugitives , It's a mad , mad mad world , Inherit the wind , Judgement at Núremberg , On the beach , Ship of fools , The secret of Santa Vittoria , The Domino Principle , Guess who's coming to dinner , among others .
jjnxn-1
Direct from the What Were They Thinking files comes this bloated pageant of staggeringly foolish proportions. All about getting a cannon through battles and assorted other nonsensical issues this overripe piece of twaddle has a few things in its favor, nice scenery and beautiful color photography. They are outweighed however by the inert direction of the usually competent Kramer and even more by the complete miscasting of the principle actors. Sophia is gorgeous and was just starting in American films so her being shoved into whatever was available at the moment no matter how unsuitable can at least explain her presence here. Cary Grant who would seem a natural in period films actually looks rather absurd and is stiff as a board, he apparently felt the same way and after this often referred to this film with mocking scorn. He and Sophia, who became involved during the making of this stinker, would be much more properly and happily paired the next year in Houseboat a delightful comedy which is the place to see them together, not here. Worst of all is Frank Sinatra preposterously cast as a Spanish freedom fighter with both an atrocious accent and wig. He is simply dreadful. Worth watching only to see how an A level film with major stars and a respected director can go wrong in pretty much every aspect.
johnpipe-1
From an old post:" 2) The Gun that's a huge fifty-foot cannon: There are two scenes that I have very vivid memories of. In the first the gun is suspended somehow a hundred feet up in the air over a wooded road, hidden from the French troops. It's night, the Frenchmen march underneath the gun and never look up. There's a line from one of the Spanish, "Why should they look up?" In the second scene, they're hauling the cannon up a mountain (!?) when the restraints break and the gun careens back down the mountain and crashes. "Those details are not from the movie, but from the comic-book version; I had that comic in addition to Forester's 'The Gun', both of which I purchased and read immediately after watching the movie when it first played in the theaters.I specifically remember that "up in the air over the road" comic-book deviation from the movie, it was the first of many details, and the one that I felt was most ridiculous, that disappointed me about the comic-book adaptation; and, I have the movie DVD now, and have watched it recently to confirm various details. In the movie, it's a gully, not a road, the only road is above. The comic-book deviated many times from the movie details.
