Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #6824 in DVD
• Released on: 2002-01-14
• Rating: Parental Guidance
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Black & White, Dubbed, Full Screen, PAL
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: Arabic, Bulgarian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, Greek, Hebrew, Hungarian, Icelandic, Italian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Spanish, Swedish, Turkish
• Dubbed in: French, German, Italian, Spanish
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 114 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
From Here to Eternity offers a much more heartfelt interpretation of the event that propelled the United States into World War II than any film made in recent years. Here there are no angst-ridden scenes where "true love" returns from the dead, no costly CGI and definitely no Hallmark happy ending. This is a film about illicit sex, military machismo and tragic loss of love, friendship and ultimately life. The filmmakers did, however, have to make some compromises when adapting James Jones's novel: Alma becomes a "hostess" rather than a prostitute and the very downbeat ending, where Captain Holmes is essentially rewarded for his brutality by the military, was replaced with the morally acceptable punishment of his actions by a more self-aware army. Although Private Robert E Lee Pruitt's story provides the meat of the film, there are other subplots woven into the narrative, including a couple of doomed love affairs, which explore themes of adultery and social acceptance. Sergeant Warden (Burt Lancaster) begins a torrid affair with the commander's wife Karen (Deborah Kerr) leading to one of the most famous moments in movie history--the "clinch in the surf". From then on everything is challenged. Love, honour and eventually whether you should conform or stand up for what you believe in. At the end the couples are left wondering about the future of their relationship, but fate decides for them as the Japanese launch their attack on Pearl Harbor, leaving us with one of the most dramatic and moving endings of any war film.

On the DVD: The black and white film is not anamorphically enhanced but presented full frame in its original aspect ratio of 1.37:1, although the transfer is well done and the picture is pretty sharp. Sound is 2.0 mono rather than the standard 5.1 reworking of the audio track, and it works. The dialogue is clear without any noticeable hiss. There's a 22-minute "making of" documentary, which doesn't really do justice to the film and contains very little information of interest. Along with this is Fred Zinnemann's As I See It, an extract from the director's home video footage from the shoot. You also get the theatrical trailer, but the best feature is the audio commentary, by Fred Zinnemann's son Tim and screenwriter Alvin Sargent, which has some fantastic detail about the struggle between director and studio-head Harry Cohn over casting, along with the run-ins with the censor and US military over the "inflammatory nature" of the film.--Kristen Bowditch

DVD Description
DVD Special Features:

The Making Of "From Here To Eternity"
Excerpt from "Fred Zinneman: As I See It"
Commentary by Tim Zimmerman and Alvin Sergeant
Theatrical Trailer
Filmographies
Languages: English, French, German, Italian, Spanish
Subtitles: English, French, German, Polish, Czech, Hungarian, Hindi ,Turkish, Danish, Arabic, Bulgarian, Swedish, Finnish, Icelandic, Dutch, Norwegian, Portuguese, Greek, Hebrew, Spanish, Italian
Fullscreen, 1.33:1

Synopsis
An all-star cast brought what was considered an unfilmable James Jones novel to the screen with skill and grace. The story involves the loves, hopes, and dreams of those in a close-knit army barracks in Hawaii shortly before the attack on Pearl Harbor. Montgomery Clift portrays a former boxer who refuses to fight after blinding a friend in the ring and is sent to the remote outpost as punishment for his insubordination. Love and tragedy abound in this unflattering look at American military life before the war. Fred Zinneman's sweeping film also stars Burt Lancaster, Deborah Kerr, Donna Reed, and Frank Sinatra.

Customer Reviews

A Very Convincing First Sergeant
This ia a case of an outstanding movie being adapted from a great book.

FROM HERE TO ETERNITY presents a realistic portrait of army life in Hawaii immediately before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. The film features strong performances by Burt Lancaster, Deborah Kerr, Frank Sinatra, Donna Reed, Ernest Borgnine and Montgomery Clift. An extremely competent supporting cast includes Jack Warden, Philip Ober and Mickey Shaughnessy.

Burt Lancaster makes a convincing first sergeant. One who is running the show and is full of knowledge about how the army really works. He also has good instincts when it comes time to act as he demonstrates in the showdown with the sadistic "Fatso" played by Ernest Borgnine. Borgnine himself is exceptional in his most famous impersonation of a villain.

Frank Sinatra definitely deserves his Oscar in the role of the defiant Maggio. However, after seeing Lee Marvin play a drunk it is hard to appreciate any other actor's attempt compared with Marvin's portrayal of one in PAINT YOUR WAGON.

FROM HERE TO ETERNITY was a relatively low-budget production but it still managed to receive five Academy Awards and eight nominations.

A classic that lives up to its reputation
From the days when doorstop novels (or at least large chunks of them) were turned into films rather than mini-series, From Here to Eternity may be toned down to please both the censors and the US Army, whose co-operation was vital to the film, but it's still a superb piece of film-making that slips in a few powerful punches between the lines.

Set in Pearl Harbor in the months leading up to the Japanese attack, it focuses on two professional soldiers: Prewitt (Montgomery Clift), a hard-headed ex-boxer given 'the treatment' by his commanding officer to force him to fight in the regimental boxing championships, and the company's Top Sergeant (Burt Lancaster), who is having an affair with the officer's frigid wife (Deborah Kerr).

Daniel Taradish's screenplay is a masterpiece of snappy construction, perfectly mirrored by Fred Zinnemann's directorial style that brings out both the toughness and the sentiment with a convincing lack of sensationalism. And what a cast: Lancaster a convincing mixture of toughness and emotional vulnerability, a surprisingly sexy Kerr, Donna Reed playing tough against type, Borgnine at his meanest and a wonderful array of character actors. Clift may make an unlikely boxer, but his performance is one of his best, as is that of Sinatra, always under-rated as an actor on those occasions when he made an effort, as his doomed best friend Maggio.

With a good DVD transfer, this is let down by the extras - only a teaser trailer, a making-of featurette that runs a full two minutes (!!!), a brief extract from a documentary about the director and an audio commentary by Tim Zinnemann and Alvin Sargent. This is still well worth adding to your collection, though. Classic films often don't live up to their reputations. This one does.

The best Pearl Harbor movie - ever...
This movie rocks, it has got all the ingredients of the best film noir. This is the most intelligent film in terms of its analysis of the human nature and soul and beyond this shows the incredible naivity of the US military just before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. And then comes the attack and a whole world collapses with the most cruel of all reality checks. Simply brilliant, this is a must in any DVD collection.