We’re marathoning every single Best Picture winner starting with Fred Zinneman’s 1953 war film From Here to Eternity
Quick review: From Here to Eternity is the kind of old-school Hollywood melodrama that you can’t help but fall for. And while it only occasionally hits greatness, the performances by Burt Lancaster, Frank Sinatra, Montgomery Clift, Deborah Kerr, and Donna Reed are as iconic as they come.
There’s something so old Hollywood about From Here to Eternity that it’s not hard to imagine why it won eight Oscars from thirteen nominations — coming close to tying All About Eve’s nominations record. And while the movie’s melodramatic storyline and gratuitous hero shots, including the iconic beach scene with a steamy Burt Lancaster, director Frank Zinneman was often lauded for his “social realism” in his time.
After discovering his parents had tragically died in the Holocaust, his focus shifted to movies set during World War II starting with his breakout The Seventh Cross starring Spencer Tracey. He then found Oscar success with The Search, nabbing his first nomination for Best Director, even though the war had just ended a few years earlier.
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But it’s High Noon that would become his most enduring work as his gritty and dark realism shifted to something more hopeful. As critic Stephen Prince put it, Zinneman had his protagonist “fight rather than run.” That same all-American heroism found it’s way into his adaptation of James Jones’ novel From Here to Eternity, published just two years earlier.
The movie follows three men in the U.S. Army stationed at Schofield Barracks on the island of Oahu during the precipice of the U.S. entering the war. Private Robert E. Lee Prewitt (Montgomery Clift — he worked with Zinneman in The Search, which earned him a Best Actor nod), a new transfer to the barracks, is regularly singled out for punishment and grunt work after he refused to join the boxing team.
First Sergeant Milton Warden, who was ordered to dole out the rough treatment by Captain Dana “Dynamite” Holmes (Philip Ober), takes pity on Prewitt and convinces the captain from court martialing him. However, he’s partially motivated by the fact that he’s carrying out an affair with Holmes’ wife Karen (Deborah Kerr). The third man to round out the trio is fast-talking and quick-witted Private Angelo Maggio (Frank Sinatra), who befriends Prewitt.
Part military drama, part soapy melodrama, before taking a turn completely towards war movie, From Here to Eternity truly thrives off the power of its star performances. Of the three leads, Sinatra’s exploration of the headstrong Maggio, who eventually finds himself in trouble with Staff Sergeant James R. “Fatso” Judson (Ernest Borgnine), is easily the most compelling (it would earn him the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor).
It’s hard to discern what Zinneman is trying to say with the movie. However, Maggio’s tragic storyline partially reveals it as the military’s brutality and hypocrisy for the sake of maintaining masculinity. Perhaps that’s a presumptuous assessment. But evaluating the movie through the lens of the novel (and removing the censorship that pared down the movie’s content) reveals its themes — at least somewhat.
Still, the movie’s most iconic scene, the beach scene, and Lancaster’s on-screen romance (and kiss!) with Kerr are what stick with you. It’s so classic Hollywood that it’s impossible to resist — even if the cynic in you resists. That storyline never really fits in with the rest of the movie thematically, yet it feels like a welcome respite from the overly masculine energy in other scenes. While Kerr and Donna Reed, who plays the hostess at a local social club and Prewitt’s love interest Lorene, are beholden to the men’s storylines, they also are the emotional core that challenges how the military takes over people’s lives.
There’s one scene between the three leads that propels the story into the final act that feels like the watershed moment we don’t talk about nearly enough. Part of that is because of the scene’s homoerotic energy. In the novel homosexuality in the military is a primary theme. More importantly, it’s the first scene where the main characters shed their usual stoic masculinity and finally express their feelings.
However, those moments are fleeting as to be expected in the era of chiseled jaw Hollywood leading men, which prevents From Here to Eternity from reaching greatness. Still, the iconic scenes and performances have endured for a reason. There’s so much charisma on screen that every frame feels like you’re being dared to look away. When they say there aren’t movie stars anymore, it’s movies like this that explain why.
Hey, I'm Karl, founder and film critic at Smash Cut. I started Smash Cut in 2014 to share my love of movies and give a perspective I haven't yet seen represented. I'm also an editor at The New York Times, a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic, and a member of the Online Film Critics Society.