Purely Joyful Movie!

Plot so thin, it passes unnoticed.

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

This is definitely not a movie for everybody. It is a bit of an odd number, a romantic love story as well as a fantasy intended for for adults. Hollywood, which, these days, usually produces movies intended for audiences in high school or, at most, their early 20s, doesn't do films like this one. Neither, for that matter, does much of anybody else. In fact, About the only other example of this unusual genre that comes immediately to mind is the haunting "A Matter of Life and Death", produced in Britain by Powell and Pressburger.The story revolves around the appearance of a Dutch yachtsman among a group of wealthy expatriates residing in a Spanish seaside village called "Esperanza" (Hope). The Dutchman, played without the least trace of a Dutch accent by the extremely English James Mason, calls himself "Hendryk van der Zee" (literally, "Henry of the Sea"). He turns out to be none other than the legendary Flying Dutchman. Every seven years he is permitted to re-appear on land briefly, to attempt to find a woman who will agree to die for him, thus freeing him from his curse of sailing the seas for eternity.Those who's taste in movies runs to to things like "Speed II" and "Prom" will probably not like this one. However, those whose taste is a bit more mature, and who appreciate the sort of material that requires a moderate degree of erudition, might appreciate this moody, atmospheric, beautifully photographed and expertly staged story.

Well, call me "histrionic" (hahahahaha), but... I'm watching it just now for perhaps the third or fourth time since I was seven or eight years old. I was dumbstruck by it then. I guess she was, too. I met her 20 years later. She'd literally made herself into this character. The woman men will do anything for. We took her marriage apart then, and took one of mine apart 15 years later.Well, she wanted to be stimulated, and I evidently did it as well as anyone for a time, even though I was no James Mason, Clark Gable or even Leslie Howard.Today, I am a devotee of direct, wordless experience. And there is much to be directly experienced right =now=. "And to have found her faithless!" So I "killed all that I loved," and shut myself off from that much life after so many years of trying to find it again. "Faith is a lie, and God himself is chaos!" "He will find no woman faithful and fair." "Would I sail alone 'til doomsday?"Bewitched (or =something=) by all this drama, I suffered as he did for 35 years... until I put my wordless consciousness into the oven and used this film again to be "there" with her. Regardless of what anyone else thinks, P&TFD is a ten for me =personally=, even if it is a product of its time and a pretty fair attempt to follow in the footsteps of George Bernard Shaw. The melancholy may dearly love it. But those who need to work their way through a "timeless love" may find the keys to their prison cells right here.

The mystical romance between a society girl (AVA GARDNER) and a man condemned to roam the seas and only hit port every seven years (JAMES MASON) is brought to the screen with handsome production values and gorgeous Technicolor. But the story itself, while it has many original touches, never really brings the characters or their motivations to life. The explanations are there, but they ring hollow for the sort of outrageous behavior committed by the principals, including peripheral characters such as the swaggering bullfighter and a racing car driver who's impulsive enough to crash his car into the ocean to prove his devotion to Pandora. NIGEL PATRICK is excellent in the pivotal role of the man who loves Pandora unwisely.Albert Lewin, the director, seems drawn to these kind of other world stories, having done some of his best work in the fantasy genre, as for example with THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY. Aspects of that tale are present here, with Mason as an artist who at the film's start is painting a portrait of Pandora, a woman he's not yet met but is fated to encounter very shortly. The mystical elements aren't drawn together too convincingly but seem more like pieces of a puzzle that are missing and will never be found.Ava Gardner was at the peak of her beauty and is well cast as Pandora in a role that might have easily been played by another star of that era, Rita Hayworth. Mason manages to look grimly determined on cue and gives an effortless performance as the Flying Dutchman, but this is a film that is not likely to have wide appeal outside of patrons who can appreciate its artistic leanings.Nevertheless, it's a "must see" for fans of either Ava Gardner or James Mason even though their characters are not as strongly realized by the scriptwriter as one could wish. Fortunately, the chemistry between them does click.

It seems churlish to begin with a cavil but this print was preceded by an on-screen message that it was a 'restored' version, only to be followed by what looked like a washed-out third or fourth generation print. It may well have been Lewin's intention to shoot in dull tones in 1950 but somehow I tend to doubt it. There's an immediate nod to A Matter Of Life And Death both in the central couple - one dead, one living - and the use of Harold Warrender, a 'scientific' type who complements perfectly Roger Livesey's 'doctor' and also serves as narrator. As for the hokum that masquerades as plot the less said the better, in this case it is definitely a case of Style not Content. Gardner is so gorgeous she doesn't really need to do anything else yet by 1950 MGM had moulded her into a fairly half-decent actress and Mason was well up to handling any real acting that needed doing. On the other hand Sheila Sim demonstrates yet again why her screen career consisted of a mere ten movies, just as well she married Dickie Attenborough otherwise she may have starved to death. Dorothy Parker wrote only a handful of lyrics, notably I Wished On The Moon, but another is performed by Gardner here, How Am I To Know, and performed well. Apart from this it's the visuals and symbolism that are the main interest and in a decent print they would have been stunning.