I love this movie so much

Waste of time

I wanted to but couldn't!

Absolutely Brilliant!

I had only known Robert Strauss as one of the funny privates in the movie Stalag 17. I never knew that he had a starring role of his own in his own movie. The sad thing about this is that he died right at the time of the movies release. It's in black and white which adds even more dark contemplation to the mood! I recommend this singularly unique, unusually different film I've never seen its like before! Watch it!

This is a movie about America and generational shifts. The fact that it was originally shot in 1968 should give you a clue. Plot: old-school army veteran is stranded alone on an enemy (communist China) island outpost sometime after nuclear holocaust (presumably). There are several plot-lines which must resolve during the course of the film.The first is, How does a man - any man - deal with absolute loneliness and the hopelessness associated with knowing that no one else exists in the entire world? Of course, this a step or two beyond Tom Hanks' Cast Away, as there is hope for Hanks, even if the pathos at that movie's end is also debasing. For Robert Strauss, the tour-de-force participant and titular "The Noah," the resolution is quite dramatic if entirely expected. I won't spoil the actual progression of Noah's self-awareness or madness, as the case may be, but I would like to comment that it's not as cleverly done as Cast Away. On the other hand, the impact of The Noah is exceptional, and with subtlety.The second resolution must be, How does a World War 2 dog-of-war deal with the modern (for 1968) age? This is handled on several levels, some with skill, some with a ham fist - your view on which are which will likely be tied to your birth year. Those of "the greatest generation" will possibly feel a great sympathy for the lead character, while those of the "hippie generation" could find themselves alternately awed then nonplussed (younger than that, and you'll be lost, except as it concerns fictional empathy). Not that director Daniel Bourla gave Strauss much more material than playing off old audio tapes from history; or that the screen writing called for a narrow range of emotions, from crotchetiness to self-pity. This is the main weakness of the film itself.The third resolution must be the filmmaker's (and thus your) view of America, especially in juxtaposition with communism. Will you be disgusted, cheered, or bored by the "army" of Chairman Mao busts? Where will you fall in the melange of flags, uniforms, culture shifts, and overarching philosophies? I found the movie to be quite schizophrenic in this regard, and that added another stratum of complexity to an already meaty subject. Just to mention one scene, after the "graduation" the "natives" become restless and it appears that a revolution is brewing; the manner in which The Noah attempts to meet this challenge is fascinating but at the same time quite excruciating since there is little doubt on the end-game and therefore not a lot of tension.Other implications from 1968 are apparent here and there: (1) the obvious counter-cultural message from Friday and Anne-Friday; (2) the overbearing war soundtrack; (3) the selection and arrangement of historical excerpts. Most of this is a bludgeoning message and therefore may be disregarded as so much era-centered squealing.On the very plus side, the finale will mark you. It is deeply etching and undeniably disturbing. It is not that it ices a cake, but that it is the cake. We learn in fact that the entire movie was a baking process leading to a product, which is the final few minutes. It will make you judge the rest of the film that much more harshly, but maybe that's good.

This is one of these movies that linger.Following the total annihilation of the human race only one person appears to be alive. An old soldier, close to retirement, when the bombs start falling, escapes across the sea and finds himself on a deserted island, filled with derelict motor vehicles and empty military barracks showing a history of both chines and Japanese occupants.Loneliness creates an illusionary friend, whom he can be responsible for (and boss around), and by mistake he also makes a woman, who turns out to despise him. When his friend and the woman couple, he evicts both from his house (his mind).Then he makes a boy, and in quick succession more children, a whole school class, and education system and a graduation day, where he sends all of his students out to (re)populate the earth. But it soon turns out they make a mess of things - rather than coming to him, their teacher, for advice, they just squabble and murder one another. So he lays down simple rules - basically the stone tablets of Moses, but voiced as the simple man he is. But his children pay him no heed.From then on everything just goes downhill - his creations recreate all that went before his arrival to the island; the final third of the film sees The Noah, as his first friend called him, marching around the island trying to bring control at least to his illusionary military troops, while the recordings of global warfare and unrest rack his mind to the point, where he COMMANDS the silence be.He retracts to his bunk in the barracks, and silence falls on his world, the minute he closes his door. Here he discovers that the radioactive warning tag that he carries on his uniform has gone black. The rain was radioactive, and now he has no other mission but to wait for death.THIS is a brilliant movie! Forget the Biblical allegorical stuff and view it in a larger perspective: Whether messages came from a Maker or not, men translated the messages into words. I.e. Men made the world in their image - they made what they already were. The singular human being will always create the world in his own image - his loves, his fears, his longings, his desires, all that man makes is himself.The Noah tries to make a new world, and tries to take control of this new world, because this is how he is brought up - he tries to delegate responsibility and is disappointed; he tries to take full control, and is disappointed; he relinquishes responsibility and is disappointed; he closes his door on his creation, his fellow men and all their disappointments, and all he gets from all and everything he did, is death.A very poignant and eternal message: You are what you are, and so is your world. All changes must then come from within. We are human beings from how we deal with the perception of our world. The perception is the world - that is the weak and the strong point. There is no one reality, no right reality - only different views of wild wild nature.If you are not well versed in Roman languages, or the imagery of WWII and the Cold War, you'lld do best in getting a subbed version, so as to enjoy the cultural commentating embedded in the use of German, French, Italian, Spanish and other war commentators as well as people on the street in wartime.This is not an anti-war movie, as some might think - it's a film about reality.

I have only seen the last portion of this film on a cable channel about five or six years back (I think it was City College's channel, which frequently runs unusual film courses). I remember when THE NOAH came out in the middle 1970s. There was a review of it in NEW YORK MAGANZINE, and it got panned. But when it was shown on television it was treated with considerable respect.Basically (and ironically, as Strauss died after it was briefly released) it was Strauss's biggest chance to display his own acting skills to their widest. After his two appearances with Billy Wilder and his THE ATOMIC KID with Mickey Rooney, he was basically relegated to small support roles of a comic nature. He did have a recurring part as "Charlie Leech" the private eye who discovers that "Samantha Stevens" (Elizabeth Montgomery) was a witch on BEWITCHED, but he was only in a handful of episodes there. Strauss was always game for acting roles, and was perfectly willing to try carrying an entire film on his own shoulders. Here it was (except for two voices) as the sole human being left on earth after a nuclear war.One recalls the unfolding, unstoppable tragedy of ON THE BEACH, but there the citizens of Australia did have each other to live with until they all died in the end. Here Strauss is on an island, well stocked with food and supplies, and with radio contact to the rest of the globe. But there is no "rest of the globe" to contact. Initially he meets the situation with vague disbelief, then panic. But gradually he determines to face the end of humanity (in himself) with dignity. Our last image of Strauss on film is rather stoical, watching to see if anyone will show up after all, but determined not to give into temptation to make a fast end of it if he can.I wish the film was shown again - it was not as worthless a picture as the critic in NEW YORK MAGAZINE made it seem. And it gave Strauss a fine coda role to his underused career.