Linbeymusol
Wonderful character development!
Incannerax
What a waste of my time!!!
Pluskylang
Great Film overall
Brooklynn
There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.
rightwingisevil
still quite watchable by great acting of n.w. and r.r. r.r. played the reluctant bad news messenger who came to town to lay off many railroad workers and killed the whole town. n.w. played the whoring beauty who was viciously pimped by her mother. the young female actor who played the younger sister of alva, well, the impression i got from this movie was her ugly nose and day-and-night differences between she and her elder sister. to me, if n.w. was not drowned so young and so early, she would have received so many Oscar or any other movie festivals awards as "the best actress" for so many times and again. what a loss and tragedy to us. she's not only a beauty but also a natural born actor. r.r. also looked so handsome and played a decent role in this film. but if you have watched this film adapted from the great American play writer, you'd inevitably find out that there were so many flaws in this specific play that have caused the screenplay writer, another great movie culture contributor, wrote a over-the-top pretentious and too much staged pretentious screenplay. if without the effortless and natural performance of the lovely actress, the movie itself would only have turned out barely watchable, since the whole movie was just so pretentious and overly staged. a mother pimping her daughter to get by? a married old guy openly obsessed with a young woman and with the consent of her mother, well, disgusting but possible.
pointer165
First Natalie is breathtaking to watch and I still miss her!.. her sister ,is played by the wonderful Mary Badham. The search for the right girl for " To Kill a Mockingbird" ended up with children that had no acting experience ( IN THAT AREA they filmed) in their lives(Mary played Scout )but forever became a part of our lives with their incredible performances...and she also stands out ,a bit older then" to Kill a Mockingbird" but still that feisty character that played "Scout" in Mockingbird! but Natalie steals this movie ....I just love watching her act..and Sydney Pollack directing Redford would prove a very long collaboration.I think Redford is the same in almost any movie, if they need a wild game hunter,"Out Of Africa" but costarring with Streep, they give a wonderful performance and he does the same thing as if it was in "Barefoot on the Park" nothing differs with his acting, that's my opinion but I like him in his movies...Hubbell .another name that will always go down in Film History...another point,Natalie wears ONE dress this entire movie, a thing a Hollywood actress would shun away from...but Tennessee Williams as the writer, you can't go wrong.Anytime I hear his words, as I do Truman Capote's words.."the world is AOK!" for me..WOW...Redford did "Barefoot in the Park" one year after this movie...that's interesting!revised: I just looked at it again and she wears more than one dress in the movie..sorry Natalie fans!..still just a great movie..how times were, when all you had to worry about was"train service" but T.Williams adds the fact of so many losing jobs, from the lose of that train service
preppy-3
Drama takes place during the Depression. Owen Legate (Robert Redford) goes to a small town in Mississippi to lay off railroad workers (the towns only source of income). There he meets wild Alva Starr (Natalie Wood) and her overbearing mother Hazel (Kate Reid). Alva wants to get out of the town and see Owen as her ticket...but her mother has other ideas. It's all ends tragically.This was based on one of Tennessee Williams' one act plays. It was adapted by THREE writers (one being the unknown Francis Coppola). When Williams saw the final result he was (understandably) horrified. It's easy to see why--this just comes across as a very bad Williams play. It moves slowly, has characters making speeches instead of talking and has sexual situations that were probably shocking in their day but are merely tame (and silly) today. Abrupt ending too. Worst of all is Redford who gives a TERRIBLE performance. Totally stone-faced throughout showing no reaction or feelings at all. This film gets a 5 because it IS well-done. It looks good and captures the feel of its era pretty convincingly. Also Reid and Wood are excellent in their roles giving this better performances than it deserves. Those two alone make this worth watching at least once. I'm giving this a marginal recommendation because of those two. Look for a very young Robert Blake and Charles Bronsan in small roles.
Jay Raskin
It is hard to decide what is most outstanding: the atmospheric story and script by Tennessee Williams and Francis Ford Coppola, the gorgeous cinematography by James Wong Howe, the smooth direction by Sidney Pollack, or the dazzling performance by Natalie Wood.Elizabeth Taylor won the Academy Award for "Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolfe," that year and certainly deserved it, but Natalie's performance was as fine as the other nominees: Lynn Redgrave in "Georgy Girl," Vanessa Redgrave in "Morgan: A Suitable Case for Treatment," Ida Kaminska in "The Shop on Main Street" and Anouk Aimee in "Un homme et une femme" She did receive a Golden Globe best actress nomination for the film.Robert Redford is laid back here and it works perfectly. He just has to be charming and adorable and he is. In the four great romantic movies he did, "Barefoot in the Park" with Jane Fonda, "The Way We Were," with Barbara Streisand, "Out of Africa," with Meryl Steep, and this one, Redford basically allows his leading actresses to be the focus of every scene. He is at his best when underplaying and interacting and that is what we get here.Mary Badham, who was nominated as a child for her performance in "To Kill a Mockingbird" shows that she was perhaps the most natural child actress of the 1960's. It is also fun watching Robert Blake and Charles Bronson is small supporting roles.The movie is absorbing with the type of wonderfully drawn lonely, sexy, and ordinary people with grand illusions that make all of Tennessee Williams works so wonderful.Don't miss it if you haven't seen it, and see it again if you haven't seen it in a while. It hasn't aged at all.