Farewell to Arms: Warning!

[MK]

I just finished watching this movie and I didn't like it at all. I had high hopes due to it being Hemmingway and Cooper, but I was very disappointed.

Only watch it if you like stories about people who make bad decisions and everyone lives miserably ever after like in The Perfect Storm or Million Dollar Baby.

 

[Ken]

Have you read the book?

Ken

 

[MK]

No

If I had, I would have been prepared for the ending......assuming it is like the book. If they both have hopeless endings.....I am glad I didn't read the book.

It is not that I only like stories with happy endings. I just want there to be a point. Bladerunner and [The Thing[/I] (Carpenter) rate high in my book. They don't end all cheery yet there is a sense of satisfaction at the end.

The Perfect Storm's plot is they tried, they made the wrong decision and they died.

I don't enjoy that type of stories.

 

[jake_fink]

This is a terrible movie. Cooper is at his marble-mouthed worst and Andolph Menjou steals the show with his uncanny portrayal of Adolph Menjou.

The book is magnificent though, much better than The Sun Also Rises. The first few paragraphs alone are astounding. The prose overall is close to perfect. The bad decision Frederick Henry makes is the right decision for the moment. He's a young man caught between two things he can't control, a war and his love for Catherine Barclay, and he has to measure his commitment to each.

As far as it being a downer, well, yeah. Everything Hemingway wrote is a downer, so why be surpirised? He was the self appointed voice of the lost generation, afterall, and it's no coincidence that he wound up wrapping his toes around the trigger of an elephant gun.

 

[Michaelson]

Everything Hemingway wrote is a downer, so why be surpirised? .

I was thinking the same thing....I can't think of ANYTHING old Ernest wrote that was, uh, uplifting. No surprises here.

Regards! Michaelson

 

[Ken]

I have to admit I enjoyed the book.

Yes its is depressing and seemingly without hope. But i don't think its meaningless. It highlights some of the inherent complexities of the human condition and relationships.

We want to be safe, but we also want to be happy. To truly experience happiness you need to allow someone else to get close to you, and get close to them in return. This, however, makes you vulnerable as your happiness is no dependent upon them and consequently its a risk.

Ken

 

[Daisy Buchanan]

Thanks for the warning.
I have read the book, reading all Hemingway novels is a pre-requisite to being the roommate of Hemingway Jones. The book is great, I really enjoyed it. I'll make sure not to watch the movie, for I don't want to change my feelings for the author or his books.

 

[Hemingway Jones]

I was thinking the same thing....I can't think of ANYTHING old Ernest wrote that was, uh, uplifting. No surprises here.

Regards! Michaelson

I have always read "The Old Man and the Sea" as a story of redemption; he loses the fish, but he regains his self-image. I find that story uplifting. "Green Hills of Africa" is a love story to a country and its people, though with dated colonial ideals. Hemingway often surprises you. The big emotional impact in "Green Hills..." is Hemingway's friendship with his native guide and in "To Have..." it is his relationship with his wife.

Now back to the original thread, the problem I had with "A Farewell to Arms" the film is that is was a bit boring. I thought the pacing was off.

Well I don't want to provide a spoiler, but the fate of the characters is a consequence of the choices they have made. When you forgo one responsibility for another, there are going to be consequences.

I don't believe that Hemingway's works ever got the proper treatment they deserved. "To Have and Have Not" is a great film, but bears little ressemblance to Hemingway's work.

 

[Mr. Lucky]

The only decent re-creation of Hemmingway for the screen was Spencer Tracy's Old Man and the Sea. All the others, including BOTH The Sun Also Rises (anyone see that horrible mini-series with Leonard Nimoy as the Count?) just didn't make it.

Wait. Scratch that. There was ONE other - The Killers with Burt Lancaster - albeit they took wide dramatic license turning that short story into a movie. Personally, I wish someone would expand and shoot one of my personal favorite Hemmingway shorts; A Clean Well Lighted Place.

 

[Flitcraft]

Let's nor forget"Short, Happy Life of Francis MacComber"- that was cheery. Although a re-make with Johnny Depp, Sam Neil and Scarlett Johansson might be interesting! Hmmmm......

 

[Lancealot]

I have to admit I enjoyed the book.

Yes its is depressing and seemingly without hope. But i don't think its meaningless. It highlights some of the inherent complexities of the human condition and relationships.

We want to be safe, but we also want to be happy. To truly experience happiness you need to allow someone else to get close to you, and get close to them in return. This, however, makes you vulnerable as your happiness is no dependent upon them and consequently its a risk.

Ken

I couldn't agree more. I am going through some things right now that fit perfectly into this mold. To love someone is to alow yourself an opening to that person which gives them a power over you emotions which in turn makes you vulnerable. However to live with out the possiblity of love there is no happiness.

 

[mysterygal]

You know, 'the perfect storm' was a great movie I thought...but I agree on the ending, I actually got mad at Matt for buying the movie and making me watch it since he knew it had a depressing ending But I also loved 'million dollar baby' as well, but I was plenty prepared for a sad ending...million dollar baby has probably been the only movie with a sad ending that I still can say I enjoy. Other than that, if I'm going to invest 2hrs in a movie, it had better leave me feeling good at the end.

 

[Harp]

The Sun Also Rises

Hemmingway's protagonist in 'The Sun Also Rises,' a wounded WWI veteran
who lived as dignified an existence as his personal circumstance allowed,
has always struck me as a metaphor against which Gertrude Stein's quip
of a "lost generation" was refuted.