DIRECTOR: Rex Tucker
SCREENWRITER: Giles Cooper
STARS: Vanessa Redgrave, George Hamilton, Susan Engel, Donald Sutherland, Laurence Payne
COUNTRY: Great Britain
THIS BOOK
AUTHOR: Ernest Hemingway
TYPE: Novel
PUBLISHER: Penguin
THIS EDITION PUBLISHED: 1966
COUNTRY: Great Britain
COVER: Paperback
THE ORIGINAL BOOK
ORIGINAL AUTHOR: As Above
YEAR FIRST PUBLISHED: 1929
ORIGINAL BOOK TITLE: The film title
NOTES
GENRE: War
WORDS: I would like to say this is Hemingway’s great novel of love and war. And I will, but it’s not said as a result of my reading. Everyone else says it. I went through a big Hemingway phase in my late teens and twenties (didn’t we all?) and have read all his fiction (not counting the posthumous manuscripts) except for one book …. this one. On top of that I have seen every film version of the book (the excellent 1932 film with Gary Cooper, Helen Hayes and Adolph Menjou, the sprawling though underrated, 1957 film with Rock Hudson, Jennifer Jones and Vittorio De Sica) except for one version … this one. I didn’t even know this existed. In fact it seems to be, like much BBC product of the time, lost. I assume, knowing what they spent on their budgets it would have been all indoors anyway. Strictly speaking it’s a mini series for television (3×45 minute episodes) rather than a movie. A “tie-in” nevertheless.
I'm a fan of Kubrick and no, you're not being harsh. I think those enthralled by it back then are…