The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit Movie Review
nine to 5 Fellows
In Connecticut, the quondam WWII officer Tom Rath (Gregory Peck) and his wife Betsy (Jennifer Jones) are happily married middle grade couple with three children. Nevertheless, they have fiscal difficulties and Tom commutes every day to Manhattan to piece of work in a charitable organization receiving a low bacon.
Tom is tormented by the traumatic experience in war, where he killed seventeen persons including a young German soldier and he occasionally recalls his dear affair with the Italian Maria (Marisa Pavan) in 1945.
When Tom inherits his grandmother's house, her former servant claims the real state but using forged document. Meanwhile Tom is hired to work equally public relation of a boob tube network and is assigned to write a speech to the owner, Ralph Hopkins (Frederic March). Soon he needs to decide whether he will be a dedicated executive or ix to 5 fellows. Farther, he learns that he has a son with Maria and she is very needy and he needs to choose between telling the truth to Betsy or keep the secret.
"The Man in the Grey Flannel Accommodate" is a realistic and humanistic drama about choices of an insecure human being with a war trauma that frequently haunts him. Tom Rath sometimes is reluctant, thinking in the safety of his family first, but always takes the right decision supported by his beloved married woman Betsy. The story has many subplots and one memorable graphic symbol, Judge Bernstein, performed past Lee J. Cobb. The story is long but never tedious. My vote is seven.
Title (Brazil): "Homem do Terno Cinzento" ("Human being in the Gray Suit")
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Powerhouse Cast in Fine Drama
Ten years after Gregory Peck and Jennifer Jones lit up the screen with their torrid dearest-hate human relationship in "Duel in the Sun," they were reunited in this engrossing business organization-domestic drama.
The ii were surrounded by a great cast, headed by Fredric March and Lee J. Cobb, to offer a sincere portrait of a inferior Madison Avenue exec who must choose between being a "large CEO" or a "2nd-tier nine-to-fiver".
Director/screenwriter Nunnaly Johnson guided the actors in uniformly well-modulated performances, all deeply felt and cleanly expressed. Keenan Wynn offered a surprisingly subtle and touching functioning as well, in a film produced by Darryl F. Zanuck, with a Bernard Herrmann score.
What a treat it is to picket these fine thespians breathe life into almost intriguing characters from Sloan Wilson's thoughtful novel.
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Amazingly developed and satisfying drama
Warning: Spoilers
While this is not one of Gregory Peck's more famous films, it sure deserves to be--particularly for its deep, circuitous and amazingly adult plot. Now I do non say "adult" as in sleazy or violent, only considering the movie dares to tackle the true trouble caused past overseas romances during WWII.
Peck is a top executive with his firm and is happily married. Life is very practiced. However, unexpectedly, Peck discovers that he'due south got a child living in Italy. It seems that when he was at that place in the state of war, his brief romance had resulted in a child. He never knew that had occurred and beingness a decent man at heart, when he learns he tin't allow the child to continue as just another petty bounder. Despite every reason to pretend the child did not exist (force per unit area from his wife and boss), he bravely did the right thing--and that is the essence of and then many of Peck's greatest characters. They weren't perfect, but similar Atticus Finch in TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, he acted even when it would take been so much easier and safer to have done nothing. A wonderful film.
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Man deals with a new job and an unsatisfied married woman
A man, feeling pressure from his wife for a amend lifestyle, takes a new job with increased pay but added stress. To make matters worse, he becomes embroiled in legal actions concerning an inheritance from his grandmother. On acme of all this, he learns that some of his actions in Italy during Globe War 2 accept come to haunt him. This is a well told story with many sides to it, and I feel the use of flashback went a long style in making it even meliorate. Well worth seeing.
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An Underrated Melodramatic Masterwork
Alarm: Spoilers
"The Man In The Gray Flannel Accommodate" (1956) is something nosotros don't go from our cinema-going experiences anymore; an analytic and methodical glimpse into the bug of family strain that either drive the states to distraction or build our moral character. The film stars the quintessential man of integrity, Gregory Peck equally Tom Rath. He's a congenial expert natured gentleman whose career doesn't seem to be living upwards to the expectations of his wife, Betsy (Jennifer Jones). Prodded past Betsy's nagging, Tom takes on a more lucrative position at an ad agency, and then discovers that a role of his near forgotten by has come back to haunt him. During WWII Tom and fellow soldier buddy, Caesar Gardella (Keenan Wynn) picked upwardly a pair of Italian girls and had some backside-closed-doors fun to alleviate the pressures of war and home sickness. That night results in the birth of an illegitimate kid. What to do? Tell Betsy? Go to Italian republic? See the child? What to do? Working from a masterful bit of authorship past Sloan Wilson, manager/author Nunnelly Johnson has brilliantly conceived a poignant cinematic reflection of a man pushed to the edge of his temperament, who decides to rise to the occasion rather than toss everything he's worked difficult for into the ash can. Gregory Peck is the very essence of manly integrity – a stoic charmer that completely satisfies and buttresses the whole film. Yes, the catastrophe is a rather matter-of-fact conclusion to the whole quandary, and in a fashion befitting 50s sexual politics, but until then the story functions equally something of a zeitgeist for honor, self-reliance and self-reflection in the every man that is sourly lacking in any of our contemporary representations of cinematic masculinity.
The transfer from Flim-flam Abode Video is, in a word, marvelous. It's Cinemascope (2:35:ane) and glowing from corner to corner in the rich vibrancy of 50s Technicolor. Transitions between scenes suffer from the inherent flaw of all early scope movies (a momentary degradation in color and sudden grainy characteristic). But this is a flaw in the original photography, not the DVD transfer. Colors are rich, sumptuous and bold. Contrast levels are bang on. In that location are rare hints of film grain, mostly in the war time flashback that uses actual newsreel footage. Contrast levels are also a fleck lower than one would expect during these scenes. Overall, the image will surely NOT disappoint. The audio is remixed to stereo and recaptures much of the original vibrancy of six rails magnetic stereo. Extras include audio commentaries, trailers and a restoration comparison.
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Workplace values nether scrutiny
This picture from the 1950's goes beyond the disharmonize in balancing home and work commitments considering it too deals with the loss of idealism by young people who become caught upward with the demand to provide and the competition to succeed. Life seems to have gotten worse in the 60 years since this movie was fabricated. In fact, some people, both men and women, have given upwardly on the thought of family life in favour of success in the business concern world. Ane can only judge at the level of social dysfunction from our addictive and bogus work environments. In this moving picture, a cast of exceptional acting talent provides great entertainment every bit well equally an insight into the shallow lives that many people began to lead in the 1950's. Jennifer Jones signals her dissatisfaction with her husband's work ethic. This at first struck me as a yearning for a lost youth, wanting her husband Gregory Peck to provide for his family while keeping his knight in shining armour paradigm. But Jones is no status seeker; she senses the tedious conventional work earth that her husband inhabits is not healthy for him or the family. Fredric March, that icon of American integrity, is the visitor Chairman. On the surface, he pays lip service to family unit values but struggles with his own estrangement from his wife and a daughter'south elopement. Peck learns from March equally a mentor but also in his failings as a man. Lee J. Cobb has a supporting role every bit gauge and family unit friend. Towards the stop of the flick, after some setbacks, Peck and Jones accept a courageous step together that shows their own integrity and their maturity as a couple. The picture is a another landmark for the Globe War Two generation who came back to noncombatant life and encountered a new world. It is one worth watching!
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A salient commentary on the American executive lifestyle
I was pleased to get a take chances to see this moving picture -- at to the lowest degree half of information technology -- during a bout of insomnia. The title was a catchphrase for corporate America for many, many years, a kind of symbol for overachieving, aggressive, ambitious businessmen without principles -- in other words, the "suits."
Though I am more often than not wary of Gregory Peck'south (and Jennifer Jones') tendency to niceness, I was impressed by their work here. Their relationship was both substantial and subtle. Jennifer Jones had much much more humanity and integrity than the average housewife portrayed in other films of the 50s and 60s. Peck's graphic symbol respected her opinions and values.
But I was knocked out by Fredric March. His blazon A, workaholic executive was touching on many levels. His utter tiredness, alcoholic puffiness, and innate sadness was plastered over with a Willy Loman-like veneer of gung-ho, jolly-good-fellow false heartiness. How familiar that character was and is -- in real life. His appetite, greed and bulldoze had become a habit, and like whatever junky, he was simply unable to quit. Despite the homo losses. I will never forget the scene in his office, when his wife calls him upwardly, and he slowly hangs up the phone.
A very fine picture, with many truths nigh our national grapheme and obsessions....
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You like Spam?
I was really surprised on this film as information technology was not at all what I expected. The title suggested to me something virtually life in corporate America, merely that was but a groundwork to what was really going on.
The movie was really about men.
I certainly would non excuse the taking of the opportunity to have an illicit affair during wartime, but I can empathise the longing for warmth and affection when you are and then far abroad from home and experience that you life is about to end.
I was really taken with the character'due south (Gregory Peck) cautious arroyo to life. I tin empathize with him as he puts security and safety for his family unit about the wife'south (Jennifer Jones) wanting someone to make a difference. He was never really comfortable stepping out into a globe where he did not know the rules.
I tin certainly empathise with him in the decision to exist a ix-5 man instead of someone who builds. You don't ever know the effect that can have on a family when forced to brand that decision.
Peck played an honorable man, who tried to practise the right matter for his boss and his family. It was a fascinating motion picture, and I believe that every homo cans meet some of himself in Peck's graphic symbol.
A lot of big stars from the era: Fredric March, Lee J. Cobb, and Keenan Wynn made the movie well worth watching.
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a great picture show in need of improve editing
I had problem finding this film in the local video shop just finally saw it on television receiver. It's well worth watching. Information technology's a wonderful commentary on the American suburban corporate civilization emerging in the years following the 2d World War. Peck plays the stereotypical businessman living in Connecticut and taking the New Haven Railroad into New York Urban center each twenty-four hour period. He is faced with a number of seemingly mundane dilemmas, such as settling a deceased relative's estate, how to deal with a dissatisfied wife more ambitious than he, whether to switch jobs for better pay, and whether he should tell his new boss what he *needs* rather than *wants* to hear. Hanging over him are the ever-present memories of his wartime combat experience, which intrude on him occasionally – especially during those otherwise empty hours spent commuting on the train.
I disagree with the reviewer who found the film wearisome apart from the war scenes. One of the reasons why this motion picture works so well is that information technology regularly jolts the viewer, about lulled into complacency by the apparent ordinariness of suburban life, with those sudden flashbacks of the horrors of war. The juxtaposition of these quite different scenes was quite deliberate and speaks volumes in itself. How is information technology possible for someone who has spent four years both killing and avoiding expiry to settle into a normal life of family unit and work? Apparently it's not easy.
Furthermore, death continues to haunt the family in various, almost calorie-free-hearted means, especially by way of the children who were born afterwards the carnage had ended and for whom death is no more than existent than the gunfights in those television set westerns to which they are so conspicuously addicted. A scene near the commencement has one of the girls suffering from chicken pox, a fairly minor malady, as everyone knows. Merely she tells her male parent she has "pocket-size pox" and her sis keeps teasing her with the morbid suggestion that she is going to dice. The male parent tells her to stop, just she keeps it upward. He knows what death is all about; his children do not.
The term "workaholic" had non nonetheless been coined in 1956, just the contrast between the man who chooses a fuller, less driven life – including fourth dimension for family unit – and the human married to his career could not have been more starkly portrayed. The viewers discover themselves applauding the choice Peck somewhen makes and pitying March for not having washed and then himself.
I am a bang-up fan of the score'southward composer, Bernard Herrmann, whose music is uniquely capable of evoking a range of strong emotions in the listener. The music here is typically Herrmann, although it is not equally central a "character" in this motion-picture show every bit are his scores in, say, "Vertigo" and "Psycho." It is impossible to imagine the latter two films without the music, while this film seems less obviously dependent on its score.
Although I quite liked this picture show, it is overly long and could accept been improve edited. The several subplots needed to exist meliorate integrated into the whole. What, for instance, was the purpose of the claiming to Peck's inheritance, other than to show the persistent salvific role Cobb played in his life? This subplot could easily take been cut and the film would take suffered goose egg in terms of its overall bear on. In fact, it might have been improve for being more tightly synthetic.
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Bourgeoisie circa 1950s
The novel by Sloan Wilson, in which this movie is based, offered an innovative view of the life in a modest "bedroom community" in the Connecticut of the 50s. Nunnally Johnson, the managing director, and adapter, tried to bring the essence of the book to a motion picture that would brand sense of the text. At times, Mr. Johnson succeeds, but the motion-picture show he gave us is a bit dated when one looks at information technology today.
Granted, some things never change, but the conflicts that made the footing for this melodrama, accept been dealt with, more effectively in other, more distinguished films.
If you haven't seen the moving-picture show, peradventure you should finish hither.
In the heart of the story we are presented with the epitome of decency: Gregory Peck. This smashing homo was an excellent actor, his honesty exudes from every pore of his body. As Tom Rath, the former Helm of WWII, he has kept a secret that comes to haunt him at a crucial point of his life. Tom is aggressive, but he will not play the game until the kind president of the corporation has a heart to center talk with him, recognizing Tom is a rare commodity in the business world.
The movie offers a view of the complexity that is the corporation, as we knew information technology and so. Greed had not taken over concern yet. But what comes across conspicuously is the ambition of the people in the game of climbing the ladder of success.
Tom is happily married to Betsy, who shows signs that maybe she'll become either an alcoholic, or a Stepford married woman. Her life goes into a tail spin considering of the reality she must face up in accepting what Tom has kept hidden within. Betsy is not an endearing character; she doesn't elicit our sympathy until the finish of the film, in which she comes to have her lot in life. Jennifer Jones' interpretation of Betsy is not as effective in this flick, peradventure because of the direction given by Mr. Johnson.
The cast if first rate. Fredric March and Lee J. Cobb, two of the all-time all fourth dimension actors of the American stage and screen requite life to both of the characters they play. Seen in the pivotal function of Maria, Marisa Pavan, the gorgeous Italian extra makes an impression on us. Keenan Wynn, too, has a small, merely important part in the pic.
View this pic equally a curiosity piece, every bit it has lost some of the appeal it might accept caused when it showtime came out.
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One arrange that is far from empty
It is hard to not want to come across a film with this good a cast. Gregory Peck, Jennifer Jones, Fredric March and Lee J Cobb are reasons enough to see whatsoever flick individually, seeing them together in the aforementioned film makes one further exciting. The story too sounded very interesting every bit did the themes. The by and large positive reviews promised a lot too, despite seeing some slightly worrying criticisms at the same fourth dimension. Then 'The Man in the Greyness Flannel Adjust' was seen in loftier apprehension.
'The Human being in the Grey Flannel Accommodate' on the most part works very well, even if it did slightly disappoint. There are and so many obvious skilful things, namely the performances, the emotional power and the approach to the themes addressed. Practise have to agree however with the flaws that have been cited, mostly because of the overlength and stride. Tin come across why 'The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit' may not work for everybody, simply exercise find the appeal quite a lot more understandable.
Volition start with the proficient, as there is a lot more of that than bad. The gear up design is bonny enough without swamping the drama, even if there is a lack of authenticity in some of the past scenes. Bernard Hermann has always been 1 of my favourite moving picture composers, his score for 'Vertigo' is one of my favourite scores of all time, and information technology is here haunting and adds to the emotional power (without existence overwrought) even if information technology is not quite a character of its own in the same way some of his other scores. There is expert sympathetic direction here, even if it is a bit sluggish in the legal subplot.
Script is intelligently written and thoughtful, too as written with a lot of sincerity. The story is generally compelling, it was brave for 'The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit' to accost such heavy topical themes in the day and deal with it so direct and honestly without being heavy-handed. Then much then it does get emotional and at times painful to lookout man (not in a bad fashion), furthermore the subject and themes have such relevance and truth today so relating to what was being handled was easy. The state of war scenes are powerful and they and the aftermath do really well at showing how much damage the war did to so many without trivialising.
The characters also felt like real human beings, especially Peck's and March'southward. The performances are all round fabulous. Peck did sincere meliorate than a lot of actors at the time and he shows that here in a performance that is towards his all-time and plays to his strengths. The other standout is March, as the virtually realistic and most complex graphic symbol that he gives some poignant humanity also. Cobb breathes so much life to his character while also being reserved. Jones has a problematic character, the only one that was difficult to get behind, only gives it everything emotionally. Ann Harding and Marisa Pavan are touching in their roles.
On the other hand, 'The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit' does keep for much besides long and i does feel the length with some sluggish pacing. What would accept improved things were that if the war scenes were tightened up in the step as they do run on for longer than needed and if the legal subplot, which was not very interesting and added next to zero, was cut equally others have said.
Although the sets are prissy, the photographic camera work sometimes does feel rather static and could really accept afforded to accept been opened up more than to go far more cinematic. The ending felt anti-climactic.
Summing up on the whole, a lot of great but a few drawbacks making for a solid if flawed picture. 7/x
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A "must watch' film
The Man in the Gray Flannel Adapt is one of my elevation 10 films of all time. Yeah, it's that practiced. You may have to picket information technology twice to run across everything going on in the motion picture. The secret to watching this picture show is to put yourself dorsum into the same appointment and time. Remind yourself of what 1950's America was like 10 years after the war. How Men that had served in the War were supposed to human action, carry and get on with their life. How Women whom had been so important during the war, has so had to go dorsum to existence housewives once again. All of the to a higher place will help 'gear up' you to go the about out of this flick. It is true of some films made then long ago that they get dated. Nothing could be further from the truth with this film. The struggle between reality, expectation, duty, award and honesty all play their function. The chemistry betwixt the characters is nothing short of perfect. Gregory Peck gives (in my opinion) his best operation of any film that I've seen him in. Jennifer Jones portrays the fifty'south housewife just brilliantly. Fredric March is one of the best graphic symbol actors always and he nails this office as well. The cinematography, utilise of light and colour is also first rate. Gregory Peck's character's use of dialogue is summit notch and there are a lot of fantabulous scenes. As this pic was made in 1957, at that place are a lot of things you have to work out for yourself and which could not exist said (due to censorship rules) - merely that makes the motion-picture show all the more intriguing. At that place actually is not ONE bad role player in this film. Helen Hopkins is outstanding equally the fragile wife of a powerful executive. Even the couple's children play their roles very well and right down to the housekeeper/Nanny who will make you express joy. I promise this recommendation helps your decision in viewing this film - as you'll be in for a very special care for. I guarantee you'll nevertheless be thinking/talking about it the next day !
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Don't miss seeing this film
A wonderful film near a returning WW 2 vet having trouble plumbing equipment back into society, and feeling similar a cog in some giant bicycle. He also has to deal with flashbacks, and his indiscretion, which current of air up affecting his marriage. A classic moving picture. Should be on all Tiptop 100 lists.
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Gritty and thoughtful melodrama
This film is based upon an original screenplay past Nunnally Johnson, famous for his scintillating screenplays for THE MUDLARK (1950), MY COUSIN RACHEL (1952), and THE Three FACES OF EVE (1957). The story must have had a great bargain of personal importance for him, because he chose to direct it (it was one of 8 films which he directed between 1954 and 1960). However, Johnson was not a swell director, he was somewhat uninspired in that section and had few dynamic camera angles or sense of how to enhance drama visually, and in my stance, he became as well close to this story and cloth, and then that he lost perspective to a certain extent. The film made a big striking when it came out, largely because Gregory Peck was the star. Merely the motion picture addressed a number of pressing social and moral themes in a straight and sometimes fell manner, which was unusual for the fifties. And some of them are timeless, such equally Peck's despairing annotate virtually his wartime exploits as a Captain of a Parachute sectionalization: 'I killed seventeen men. Non people in the distance, but men I could expect at and run into, including a immature soldier whom I stabbed to death so that I could take his coat.' By addressing the issue of the traumas of the returned soldiers, haunting them notwithstanding ten years afterward the end of the State of war, this moving-picture show was very topical, and touched on the very themes which lay at the bottom of all the American pic noir of the late forties and the fifties. Another reason for the involvement in the film at the time was considering of the unusual treatment of Peck existence employed in the newly created television industry, a job you went to in Manhattan in a suit which was, often, grey flannel (hence the title). Jennifer Jones plays Peck's wife. Her role is surprisingly pocket-size, only virtually of it consists of her doing hysteria with tormented and streaming optics, in the style she ever did so well. Her married man Daryll Zanuck produced the film. There are good supporting roles for Lee J. Cobb, Keenan Wynn. Arthur O'Connell, Henry Daniell, and Gigi Perreau. (James Mason'southward daughter Portland Mason appears as Peck's daughter, just has little to do.) The Italian actress Marisa Pavan is excellent during a flashback section of the film every bit the sweet Italian girl with whom Peck has a love matter in Rome in 1945. She was the twin sis of the actress known as Pier Angeli (their real surname being Pierangeli). They both specialized in being the innocent Italian daughter with the large trusting eyes who was capable of a great love, and at that place are some Italian girls who really look similar that and actually are like that, though less now than formerly. There is a third sister every bit well, Patrizia Pierangeli, 15 years younger than the twins, who appeared in eight films betwixt 1972 and 1985. The other major role in the film is played with his usual nobility and thoughtfulness past Frederic March, every bit the rich head of a broadcasting corporation who hires Peck and whose arid and troubled private life is a major part of the story also. (The major theme there is his sacrifice of a personal and family life in society to become a business moghul.) This film sprawls both in time and in space. Numerous major plot bug are walked away from at the end of the film and left entirely without whatever resolution. Information technology is as if Johnson really needed a TV mini-series to get his circuitous stories told properly, and just had to cut it short. As it is, the picture is a mammoth 2 hours and 33 minutes long. I would say that this was a well-meaning and deeply-felt projection which partially failed, but its partial success is worthwhile. After all, films with a message are never that mutual at the best of times, and this was in the fifties era when then many bug were dodged by the social hypocrisies of the time. Congratulations, therefore, to Nunnally Johnson'south ghost, for having tried very difficult indeed to get serious near matters which were just not faced back then.
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Very serious and concerned lather opera...
The Man in the Gray Flannel Adjust (1956)
Such a considered picture show. And such dandy scenes deflated past overambition or by simply plenty implausibility to undermine the sincerity needed to work. It's not uninteresting. It's not even bad in whatever way.
Outset, what works? A stylizing not from Douglas Sirk, with a slightly exaggerated truthfulness to securely personal diplomacy. It's a beautiful pic, well paced, well seen. It has some wonderful acting. Not only is Gregory Peck his usual steady, if slow, persuasive self, a paradigm of admirable poise, but the surrounding cast is underplayed (mostly) and sharp. The way the acting (and set pattern--such moderne piece of furniture!) make up that world is convincing even equally information technology is arch. It actually makes Mad Men a bit lame in the long view.
But in that location are flaws. 1 is a step that is slow in social club to seem measured, or as I say, considered. Everything is quite important even when information technology is small. We are to experience the misunderstanding between father and girl, we are to actually sense to empty and rather meaningless corporate world that is the main backdrop. And nosotros practise. If y'all get absorbed, all is well. Only the war flashbacks seem faux. It's not a war picture, I know, but if that's the case, we are at a loss how to expect at the war sequences (which are important and long) with any seriousness.
Which brings upward a more than subtle and pervasive trouble: the overall timing of the issues if off. The key crunch within Peck's grapheme is a resolving of his war time experiences, good and bad (mostly bad, I guess, but he had a beautiful love affair and child, too, which tin be seen as expert). He struggles with this and the result gets forced into the family of his wife and children. But the state of war was over ten years earlier. He fifty-fifty says this at one bespeak, that it's so long agone, why are people so concerned? And nonetheless information technology affects him in the same way fictional characters in belatedly 1940s movies are affected. I think the flashbacks tin can be real a decade or two later, but the social adjustments seem delayed to me.
Jennifer Jones is quirky in her role here, and I came to see, particularly after she blows up at Peck in one scene, that she's quite perfect and brilliant as a 1950s mom and wife. Frederic March is really brilliant every bit a wise but troubled crumbling executive (a reminder why he was once such a disarming leading human). And Lee Jay Cobb gets a plough as a lawyer, giving it some life. Everyone is quite practiced, in fact, except the two servants--the odd older nanny for Peck's kids and the troublemaking old servant threatening a lawsuit. There are a few odd turns that are attempts at humor, and they don't work. The good sense of humor is plenty to go on the movie from unrelenting somberness. An interesting transition into the civilisation of the later 1950s.
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Homo in the Gray Flannel Well Suited ***i/2
Gregory Peck relives his state of war experiences as he tries to settle down to a normal beingness as a noncombatant post-obit World War 11. Motion over, Frederic March, ("All-time Years of Our Lives" and also in this film every bit well,) Peck has other problems.
Information technology seems that he fathered an illegitimate child while in the service. The mother wants Peck to aid out financially.
News of this indiscretion is a natural shocker to wife Jennifer Jones, who reunited with Peck after the memorable "Duel in the Sun." Screaming and beside herself at first, Jones comes to realize that helping the kid is the right thing to practise under the circumstances.
Lee J. Cobb, a bang-up under-rated role player is tops as Gauge Bernstein, who will work with Peck to provide for the kid.
A wonderful motion-picture show depicting a moral dilemma.
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a movie for all generations
This film reaches far beyond its fourth dimension. In every way, shape and grade; from the troubles to the triumphs of the protaganist, to the intensity and sincerity of its ethos, this cinematic piece of work is an under exposed classic. Information technology is my promise that this film be rediscovered and in doing so help those lost in a sea of moral relativity to detect delineation. The story cleary exposes the moral and emotional importance of honesty and its consequences. Additionally, the issue of state of war-time trauma is touched upon and its long-term impact on personal and professional relationships.
The performances by all are outstanding and volition resonate with the viewer dramatically. As a gen ten'r, I constitute this motion-picture show to be a breath of fresh air. I am not solitary. I pray that this story will be recirculated - for its impact is profound.
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Great Movie on Fake Man Versus Honest Man!!!
Gregory Peck's character Tom Rath is dishonest on several levels and his wife Betsey (Jennifer Jones) knows it!
At the films beginning, she says "You've changed!"
Through several flashbacks, we see some Tom Rath's rough war life. And Jennifer Jones pushes him to reach, and go for the improve job, but maybe it's considering she KNOWS she doesn't accept his whole eye, as she one time did. And he'due south losing his moral backbone as well!
Work---Will he be a "yes" man or will he tell his dominate the truth? Home---Will he tell his wife the truth about his war past? And how will they deal with the consequences??? Family unit vs. Work--Will he exist a "9 to 5" homo? Or will he climb up the corporate ladder with a boss who admires him???
Cracking supporting role past Frederic March, equally his boss... ----- DVD has dandy commentary by James Monaco, who was in his youth in the 50's, and a man unknown to me but a media and motion-picture show expert (per the website he gives out at the end). He mixes standard motion-picture show commentary with relevant "life in the 1950'southward" details.
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Sprawling Story Doesn't Pull Well Together
Gregory Peck and Jennifer Jones who ten years before lit up the screen in Duel from the Dominicus gather again for a film that'due south as far removed from that classic every bit George Washington to George Bush.
The Man in the Grey Flannel Suit but doesn't interpret well for the screen. A whole lot of plot elements, some in themselves could be film subjects, don't quite mesh together to brand a whole film.
Gregory Peck is Mr. Fifties typical suburbanite with the married woman, iii kids and a mortgage and looking to do better for himself and his family unit. I of his commuter friends, Gene Lockhart tells him of a job opening at a TV network and he applies for it. The head human, Fredric March likes him enough, but Peck arouses the jealousy of others in the identify like Henry Daniell and Arthur O'Connell.
He's also got an inheritance problem when he gets a sprawling estate from his grandmother and and then her flagman, Joseph Sweeney, looks to contest the will. And he's got something dropped on his doorstep from his World War II service as a result of a wartime romance.
Some parts of The Man in the Grey Flannel Accommodate are nicely done. My favorite moment in it is when Lee J. Cobb playing a judge in an informal hearing in his chambers deals rather nicely with the issues Sweeney raises.
Fredric March as the communications tycoon is drawn from William S. Paley of CBS and does very well. I'thousand non sure why his family bug become put into the story. He's having problems with his rebellious teenage girl Gigi Perreau. That could have been a flick unto itself.
Even the wartime flashbacks could have been a picture plot easily. Keenan Wynn as Captain Peck'due south sergeant and Marisa Pavan as his wartime inamorata do very well in their roles. I wouldn't be surprised if this wasn't inspired past Dwight Eisenhower and Kay Summersby.
Jones and Peck still have a lot of skillful chemistry left over. I wish they had been given a more coherent story to act in.
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A Great Picture That Shows How Empty Our Lives Are
It'due south amazing this moving-picture show came out of the 50's. It's even more true today, than it was then, at present things are and so rigidly stratified in our society that people can't fifty-fifty relate to considering being a Workaholic anything other than 'worthwhile' and 'normal'. Rat Race lifestyle, is all America is about at present. Misery, stress, breach, isolation; great cloth wealth but a dysfunctional society that has fabricated little robots and zombies out of each of us. Think how vibrant yous felt as a child, how full of wonder? Remember beingness excited about the adventure to play with other kids? Now nosotros dread every infinitesimal of our lifestyle, yet notwithstanding smile and say "things are going okay" when asked. What liars we have go. A culture of liars and cruel, barbarous people, with plastic smiles frozen on our faces and our deep heartache and longing hidden abroad. This film shows that America has been on the wrong path for a long time and it's simply gotten worse. Slap-up film!! Peck is adequate, but considering the times he lived in, a pretty adept operation. Information technology's the writing and the messages of this film that stand up out!!
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Dress Casual
Practiced old fashioned quality entertainment that pays for itself and does one other thing. Gives more than it gets. Y'all can thank the star power besides as skillful story and directing which when lined up correctly does a good job in making people like me write practiced reviews gladly. It likewise attracts people like you who like to read them. This is an unusual story but easy to chronicle to equally it involves a man, his family and his trying to get ahead in a traditional conventional mode. This is the typical 1950's work hard, enhance a family, purchase a dwelling and get a skilful job because yous tin thanks to America. That is what makes us relate and stay involved as to what unfolds on the screen. This film does something else of which I am a fan of. They tell a good story within another story. Some Directors utilise this tool better than others. Here, it is done just right and helps the states to identify better with the characters portrayed. It has been said that when you lot come to know someone, you stop judging them. Hither, nosotros become intimate with the lead actor played by Peck and we really start to care and fifty-fifty root for this man. Pay attention to the salary negotiations in the movie when Peck tries to climb the business ladder. The amounts they are dickering about pale in todays society but were relevant and appropriate back then. The dynamics of the interview oasis't changed yet. Truth, integrity, honesty and implying one thing while saying some other in an artful way is the better mode to interview and to succeed. This movie proves that indicate. The world war ii scenes aid united states to recollect that the l'due south were made up of returning veterans filling upwards whole neighborhoods and job stations. The military back so didn't provide the type of training they do at present just was withal considered worthy to say that you had that feel with emphasis of serving your country being the main betoken. A dilemma comes upwardly that is handled very well after much discussion and emotions. Look forward to that. The ending is set-up very well making a betoken that still holds today because of its personal importance and contribution to social club likewise. Expert leisurely snack flick of your choice, a tasty drink and even a iv-course meal highly recommended. Good stuff
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Fascinating
In my youth i boycotted the gray flannel universe and missed seeing this move picture. Jennifer Jones' Mrs. Rath is one very practiced reason to be happy virtually this (face goes ugly and sinister when "intense" i.e. pushy & forceful). But Frederick March'southward performance as Mr. Hopkins is remarkably deep; he could accept mellowed me out a trivial politically and philosophically, and i'yard lamentable i didn't catch his performance sooner. Gregory Peck is uncanny in his ability to play every emotion with the limited range of gestures allowed a totally pent-upwardly, self-controlled man. I note mainly that the movie is a virtual textbook on what was lacking in the self-centered American adult female hooked on her own appetites and self-pity. Grand finale, she goes self-righteous. Marisa Pavan's Italian girl is, by contrast, lovely and hauntingly tender. (In vowing he has forgotten her and declaring that he worships his wife, does Tom Rath emasculate himself?)
The fifties high mode look is a slice of blueprint history, again, showing the American endeavour at copying European mode. For the fabulously wealthy, Oriental art. In the boardroom, Bracques. For the upwardly mobile, modify of residence. Nunally Johnson captures all this faithfully. The movie is a time sheathing, together with a remarkable view into a man'southward mind in its social context. The presence of the Idiot box and appearance equally medic by DeForest Kelley ("It can't exist!" i idea, when i heard "This man is dead, Helm.") make the movie prophetic. The African-American sergeant besides provides an insight into the man versus the proto-gray-flannel (affluent WASP). The grayness flannel universe nonetheless exists, but what film maker can penetrate it and show its emotional helplessness the way Nunally Johnson did in 1955-56? This film well-nigh makes it, but the parts with Lee J. Cobb as a kind of legal guardian affections seem designed to please the audience, to soften things for the audition. What do you lot think?
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Strangely wearisome and interesting at the same fourth dimension!
Nunnally Johnson is a skillful writer - but perhaps not such a proficient director. This motion-picture show is so deadening to look at that information technology almost dies. The Cinemascope frame makes information technology expect all the duller, and the cheap, simulated sets wait very, well, cheap and fake!
But the central idea here is fascinating. The film takes a serious expect at how difficult it was for men to return to ordinary everyday existences after the horror of the war. Gregory Peck is fine in the lead office, but Jennifer Jones is a niggling shrill equally his married woman.
The supporting cast is excellent. Fredric March gives ane of his best performances every bit Peck'due south troubled dominate - and Ann Harding is sensational as his unloved married woman. And Henry Daniell every bit Peck's business rival virtually steals the motion-picture show.
Just the motion-picture show is manner over-long and the catastrophe very trite. All the same worth a await.
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Very interesting melodrama
Warning: Spoilers
This is sort of an unusual melodrama, told in an unusual way involving a lot of extended flashbacks that tell us the life story of the titular (apparently) generic office worker Tom Rath (Gregory Peck). Embroiled in domestic disputes with his wife (Jennifer Jones) about money, Rath tries to switch to a more demanding corporate job and finds himself caught up in even nastier part politics involving the visitor president (Fredric March) and a pair of back-stabbing upper executives (Arthur O'Connell and the e'er nasty Henry Daniell). When a former state of war buddy (Keenan Wynn) brings him news that he has a child in Italian republic, his whole life threatens to fall apart earlier his eyes while he struggles to do the right thing.
This is a morality play without a articulate moral. The striking affair about the moving-picture show is the style that information technology puts themes in a higher place narrative consistency. At that place's no real narrative connecting the plot with March and his daughter (Gigi Perreau) to the plot with Peck and his family. Merely the thematic connections go pretty clear at the end, when Peck decides not to identify his work in a higher place his family the mode March's character did. As a effect, the motion picture does experience at times unfocused. I kept wondering every bit I was watching it, what was the point of various scenes that didn't seem connected to what I had only seen. I practise call up this is a sort of weakness, but it's so unusual that it's praiseworthy as an try.
March does some really good acting here... I honey how he plays the same scene differently with his girl and with Peck, whom he tries to make into a surrogate son. Maybe he's a scrap besides chivalrous though to be actually convincing equally a corporate kingpin; all the heavy lifting must be done by O'Connell and Daniell. In Peck he sees someone with a proficient centre similar himself, but ultimately he can't convince Peck to make the kind of sacrifices necessary to go his right-hand human.
Peck and Jones don't have much chemical science in my stance, which is the biggest flaw of the film. I was much more interested in the scenes in Italy with Marisa Pavan, who has a wonderful smile and good chemistry with Peck. In an odd way, that enhances certain aspects of the motion-picture show but makes the determination seem pat. Jones seems to be borer into the aforementioned well that she dug with Vincente Minnelli when they fabricated "Madame Bovary" together -- the frustrated housewife with aspirations to some kind of graceful life that eludes her. Merely "Madame Bovary" is a story where nosotros might empathize with the vain female protagonist almost in spite of herself, while this movie seems to want to push her down our throats. To me, her complaints about the house in the beginning seem extremely petty. What exactly is wrong with the house? I would dream of living there. But middle class definitely isn't good enough for this heroine, and I can't actually sympathize why. She puts their entire family unit in danger to join the upper echelon, and the movie seems to expect usa to respect her for it.
There are some adept character performances too, specially the ever-reliable Keenan Wynn who provides a convincing blueish-neckband contrast to the proceedings. When he tells Peck that he noticed him the first day he showed up at the office, but thought that Peck might take been giving him "the high chapeau", it'south heartbreaking in a casual kind of way. Wynn was brilliant at knowing only how much pathos to put into a scene like this. Lee J. Cobb, some other great character histrion, lends his gravitas to the role of Judge Bernstein, the force of respectability.
I enjoyed the picture show quite a bit for its restrained style and its down-to-world mood. I don't find its picture of domestic bliss totally convincing, but it's a squeamish try to prove the complexity behind the ostensibly "normal" American worker and family. It explores many of the aforementioned themes that permeate the darker crime films of the mail service-war era ("picture show noir") -- in that location'southward that remarkable speech where Peck talks about waiting for the 50-train i morning and killing people the next, then next matter yous know you lot're waiting for the Fifty-train again -- without engaging in those films' hysterical Gothic tendencies.
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An honest man tries to brand ends meet AND keep his integrity in the American rat race
Warning: Spoilers
the reviewers who constitute the plot overly complex and disjointed seem to accept missed the signal of the pic, i think. this is the story of a decent guy, straight out of a Frank Capra story (this could've been a Capra film starring Jimmy Stewart and Grace Kelly), who finds that information technology is difficult to raise a family and proceed ones integrity in the American rat race, i.east. life IS circuitous and problems come from all angles. perhaps it helps to exist able to identify with the main characters, married with kids, mid-life, struggling to stay above water, suddenly realizing that any dream other than getting out of debt seems to be slipping beyond the reach of this lifetime, disreputable rats effectually each corner trying to take advantage of you. no clear way to tell the rats from people with honest concerns, etc. i idea this film hit the boom on the head, and the scariest office was that it was made FIFTY years ago (sort of like watching Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and realizing it was made almost SEVENTY years ago), and we know the rats have honed their methods in the interim. in fact, my just disappointments were the twin deus ex machina'southward in the form of the judge and the dominate. thus, Tom Rath's (Gregory Peck's) solution is non an entirely intrinsic one, simply one that benefited heavily from a couple of good-hearted people in key positions. that might be as well much to hope for in today's America where guys like George Bailey would exist labeled as "unpatriotic liberals" and anybody who succeeds in the arrangement seems to pay nada more than than lip service to the morals of Tom Rath. nine out of ten.
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Source: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0049474/reviews
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