Bosley Crowther

A wholly amusing and engaging piece of work within the defined limitations of the aforementioned Disney style. The Disney inventions are as skillful and clever as they have ever been.

There is one mark of distinction: Mr. Stone has shot much of this film along the beautiful California seacoast in the vicinity of Monterey. That makes it easy to look at. Indeed, it makes it thrilling, at times.

This is a fascinating picture, which has something real to say about the matter of personal involvement and emotional commitment in a jazzed-up, media-hooked-in world so cluttered with synthetic stimulations that natural feelings are overwhelmed.

Remarkable...[a] most uncommon film, which projects a disagreeable subject with power and cogency.

Under Robert Rossen's strong direction, its ruthless and odorous account of one young hustler's eventual emancipation is positive and alive. It crackles with credible passions. It comes briskly and brusquely to sharp points.

This is the third time Melville's story has been put upon the screen. There is no need for another, because it cannot be done better, more beautifully or excitingly again.

Practically every moment spent with Bing and Bob is good for consecutive chuckles and frequent belly-deep guffaws.

The action is swift and the mystery fetching in this handsomely made color film. But eventually it seems a bit too obvious, imitative, old-fashioned and, worst of all, stale.

The whole thing achieves a tingling speed and irresistible tension under John Frankenheimer's direction, which deftly lifts some of the tricks of pictorial and musical emphasis from the old Nazi "Blitzkrieg" films.

The script is neither satire nor good, fresh, fanciful corn. It is a batch of old-fashioned nonsense put together without distinct charm.

Vivid, motley, ornamental and just-a-bit questionable in spots.

If you are not too particular about the images of Carroll and Tenniel, if you are high on Disney whimsey and if you'll take a somewhat slow, uneven pace, you should find this picture entertaining.

The fact that this film is constructed to endorse the exercise of murderers, to emphasize killer bravado and generate glee in frantic manifestations of death is, to my mind, a sharp indictment of it as so-called entertainment in this day.

The boys themselves are exuberant and uninhibited in their own genial way. They just become awfully redundant and—dare I say it?—dull.

A good, lively script has been written by Halsted Welles, and sharp, business-like direction has been contributed by Delmer Daves.What's more, the whole thing is neatly acted.

There are a few moments when Richard Attenborough as the chief engineer of the whole project demonstrates some impressive strength and poise. But for much longer than is artful or essential, The Great Escape grinds out its tormenting story without a peek beneath the surface of any man, without a real sense of human involvement. It's a strictly mechanical adventure with make-believe men.

Hunt Stromberg and his associates have managed to turn out a film which catches the spirit and humor of Miss Austen's novel down to the last impudent flounce of a petticoat, the last contented sigh of a conquering coquette.

Both the script and the performance of this picture have a striking integrity in putting forth the salient details and the surface aspects of the life of van Gogh.

A courageous and timely drama which touches frankly upon a phase of American life that is most serious and pertinent today. And in it Mr. Tracy and Miss Hepburn perform with a taut solemnity that is in decided contrast to their previous collaborative roles.

It is a grandly engrossing and exciting melodrama of wartime espionage, done with stunning documentary touches in a tight, tense, heroic story line.

It packs a melodramatic wallop that will rattle a lot of chattering teeth.

This picture is full of extraordinary thrills that flow and collide on several levels of emotion and intellect. And it swarms with sufficient melodrama of the blood-chilling, flesh-creeping sort to tingle the hide of the least brainy addict of out-right monster films.

Not to be speechless about it, David O. Selznick has a rare film in Spellbound.

Writers, director and producer have all of them obviously conspired to give the two stars a rapturous workout and let reason fall where it may. As a consequence, we see here a picture in which the clichés of ideal romance have been piled up so richly and warmly that a point of suffocation is almost reached.

Thanks to Mr. Kalatozov's direction and the excellent performance Tatyana Samoilova gives as the girl, one absorbs a tremendous feeling of sympathy from this film—a feeling that has no awareness of geographical or political bounds.

Apparently the Disney wonder-workers are just a lot of conventional hacks when it comes to telling a story with actors instead of cartoons.

There is more than a trace of outright hokum in this thriller...but there is also an ample abundance of scenic novelty and beauty to compensate.

In addition to Mr. Crosby and Mr. Fitzgerald, Frank McHugh, Miss Stevens, Jean Heather and Stanley Clements—especially the latter as a genial tough — give thoroughly good performances. They enrich this already top-notch film with a vigorous glow of good spirit. Going My Way is a tonic delight.