From Here to Eternity (Fred Zinnemann, 1953)

Yet another aggressively okay Oscar pic, its sole sticking point a mildly episodic structure that makes the climactic bombing of Pearl Harbor seem like an afterthought. Good performances all around. Deborah Kerr and Donna Reed (who took the Best Supporting Actress statue) seem miscast until you seem them in action. Columbia president Harry Cohn initially insisted on Joan Crawford for Kerr's role. But according to J.E. Smyth's BFI monograph on the film, she lost the part because she insisted on choosing the cinematographer (although I've always heard that she insisted instead on Sheila O'Brien, her personal costumer designer at the time). Zinnemann didn't want Crawford because "with all due respect, if you looked at Joan Crawford, you wouldn't find it impossible to believe she sleeps with everybody," whereas he wanted to preserve some ambiguity on the matter. I also learned from Smyth that Sinatra was called  a "New Deal crooner" by right-wing papers. And...that's about all I can say about this perfectly nice but eminently forgettable flicker.

Other Hollywood films which deserved the statue much more: my gawd Angel Face, Torch Song, Sweethearts on Parade, Seminole, Take Me to Town, Meet Me at the Fair, All I Desire, Calamity Jane, The Bigamist, Give a Girl a Break, One Girl's Confession, Kiss Me Kate, The Naked Spur, The Moon is Blue, The Band Wagon, The Sun Shines Bright, not to mention such ineligible masterworks as Duck Amuck, Eaux d'artifice, etc.

Grade: B