11.29.56 THE TEAHOUSE OF THE AUGUST MOON Marlon Brando went out on yet another creative limb when he insisted upon playing sly, philosophical Okinawan interpreter Sakima in the 1956 filmization of John Patrick’s Broadway play Teahouse of the August Moon. While he occasionally lapses into “flied lice” stereotyping, for the most part Brando is […]
12.05.57 SAYONARA Sayonara takes its own sweet time to unfold; in so doing, it permits us to make intimate acquaintance with its characters, so as to better understand their multi-textured motivations. The film is set in Japan during the Korean War. While on leave, pugnacious American soldier Joe Kelly (Red Buttons) falls in love […]
04.02.58 THE YOUNG LIONS Though several concessions to the censors and the box-office were made in adapting Irwin Shaw’s bestseller The Young Lions to the screen, the end result is generally effective and satisfying. Set during World War II, the film concentrates on three individuals, one German, two American. Marlon Brando plays an idealistic […]
04.14.60 THE FUGITIVE KIND Fugitive Kind began life as Battle of Angels, a never-produced 1939 play by a young Tennessee Williams. Nearly 20 years later, Williams refined this rough-hewn theatrical effort into Orpheus Descending, which enjoyed a respectable Broadway run. The renamed film version stars Marlon Brando as Valentine “Snakeskin” Xavier, a trouble-prone drifter […]
03.30.61 ONE-EYED JACKS Western bandit Kid Rio (Marlon Brando) is betrayed by his partner, Dad Longworth (Karl Malden). Escaping from prison, Rio learns that Longworth has become a wealthy and influential lawman. Rio thirsts for revenge, but bides his time, waiting for the right moment to strike. In the meantime, Rio spitefully seduces Longworth’s […]
11.08.62 MUTINY ON THE BOUNTY This colorful remake of the 1935 version again concerns the crew and treatment of the HMS Bounty by a cold hearted sadistic captain. Captain Bligh (Trevor Howard) boards the ship in Portsmouth, England, to embark on a mission to bring tropical breadfruit trees to Jamaica. Fletcher Christian (Marlon Brando) […]
04.02.63 THE UGLY AMERICAN Taken from a best-selling book, this is an uneven, politically tinged drama by George Englund that does not really follow the book that closely. Marlon Brando is Harrison Carter MacWhite, an ambassador to a Southeast Asian country that goes unnamed but stands in well for Vietnam. There is a growing […]
06.10.64 BEDTIME STORY An exercise in “black humor” bordering on the tasteless, Bedtime Story stars Marlon Brando and David Niven as a pair of womanizing confidence tricksters, operating up and down the Riviera. Pooling their talents, Brando and Niven pull off several scams, many of these requiring Brando to pose as a mental or […]
08.25.65 THE SABOTEUR Bernhard Wicki directed this hard-hitting World War II espionage drama. Marlon Brando plays Robert Crain, a German deserter who is coerced by British Intelligence officer Colonel Statter (Trevor Howard) to impersonate a Gestapo officer in order to get aboard a German blockade runner that is conveying a valuable rubber cargo from […]
02.17.66 THE CHASE All hell breaks loose in a Texas town when an escaped convict heads home in Arthur Penn’s Southern gothic melodrama. Appointed by local kingpin Val Rogers (E. G. Marshall), benevolent Sheriff Calder (Marlon Brando) manages to keep the peace in Tarl, but the situation starts to fester one Saturday when news […]
