What Price Glory? (1952)

James Cagney and Dan Dailey are soldiers during World War I, fighting for the same lovely French woman. Phoebe and Henry Ephron wrote the script.

Not Really a War Movie

I know what you're thinking -- with John Ford and Jimmy Cagney, how could one go wrong?

By using a stage play as the source material, that's how. The action, such as it is, rarely leaves the confines of a saloon and its environs. If you're looking for a gripping treatment of WWI trench warfare, you'd better keep looking.

This movie is not about WWI at all -- it's about (1) a love triangle made up of 3 one-dimensional characters, and (2)drinking. And in fact, it's really alot more about (2) than (1). It is, in fact, an anthem to something that Ford and his entourage believed in religiously: alchohol.

Why does the French girl like either of two guys? We never find out.

After a while, it just gets sort of tiresome.

This has not been my best review on Amazon, but there's really just not much to say. Five years after this joke of a movie came out, Stanley Kubrick directed Paths of Glory -- a treatment of WWI which quickly achieved classic status and is just as compelling today as it was when it was first released. I wonder if Ford ever saw it and if it was even possible for him to be embarrassed by what he had done.

August 9, 2007

......Semper Fidelis at its Best......

I happen to love this Marine film...it appealed to my Marine persona throughout the movie...it may have dwelled on the love interests in the Reserve Area at length, but the mud-Marines and their jargon was real and chippy...I thought Jimmy Gleason stole his scenes while on camera like the old pro he always was...the casting was superb...Bob Wagner and Marisa Pavan were perfectly cast as the young star/crossed lovers caught up in events beyond their control...the great John Ford had his stamp all over the hi/jinks that popped up away from the battlefield as well as Marines in battle/combat... Ford's professional acumen shows clearly the Marine camraderie between the enlisted ranks [young an old] was evident to me; rather than, to rip this war film apart, it had the battle/crest of the type of fighting men Marines are in all wars [past or present] with a few light moments in the Reserve Area with all its human entanglements that are sure to surface to the chagrin of Marine Officers...to this [Korean War] combat Marine, "What Price Glory" rates a 5 star rating of a movie....enjoy this DVD...Semper Fidelis....SSGT CHRIS SARNO-USMC FMF April 6, 2007

Uneven Cagney/Ford collaboration

I've watched the first five minutes of this movie three times, and I love it. It's 1918 and a straggling company of mud-splattered American Marines are marching through a bleak, barren and blasted landscape, led by Captain Jimmy Cagney. They approach a small French village. One of the men fall out of line to drink a dipper of water. A tall, neat and clean Marine barks "What company is this?" The weary marine treats him with disdain and answers with sarcasm. The barking soldier, top soldier Dan Dailey, is here as a replacement, with green recruit Robert Wagner in tow. Learning who commands the company Dailey tells Wagner they'll wait until the last minute before joining the company - there's obviously some bad blood between Dailey and Cagney. The men continue marching, nearing the village. We see the pretty - heck, gorgeous - inn-keeper's daughter Corrine Calvet race through the deserted streets of the village to get a place to watch the arriving American troops. A company of nattily dressed French soldiers, with band, stand at attention and the band begins to play a rousing march. Cut to a wide shot of the marching marines. Capt. Cagney picks up his head when he hears the music, his body straightens. Fifty feet from the bridge that separates his men from the welcoming French troop Cagney barks an order and the straggley men fall into line and, well, look sharp. The men pass in review - `Eyes... Right!' - and fall out. The film cuts to a young lieutenant who is glaring at Cagney, his face a study in passionate hatred.

This is the way any and every movie should start. In five short minutes, including the time it takes to run the opening titles in the middle of the sequence, we're introduced to the two major characters, Cagney and Dailey, learn they don't like each other, and, with the insertion of the balefully staring lieutenant, guess Cagney is disliked by more than a few of his men. We're even introduced to the soft leg of the movie's romantic triangle with the insertion of the Calvet character. We meet rookie Robert Wagner, the lead player in the movie's romantic subplot. The troops' march into the village is well-conceived, well-cut, and moving. Before I had a chance to settle down I was emotionally invested in this movie.

Unfortunately, it goes downhill from there. Cagney and Dailey, it turns out, have fought together from Antwerp to Zanzibar, both as brothers-in-arms and romantic rivals. They'll spend most of this movie bickering over Calvet. The rivalry is meant to be of the fast paced, screwball variety, but it's too convoluted and contrived - not to mention incredible - to care much about. The film is taken from the Maxwell Anderson stage-play, and for a motion picture it feels strangely stage bound. In movies the camera follows characters, on the stage the actors walk onto a set. An awful lot of the stuff going on here takes place in Cagney's office, or in the inn's bar, or in a field headquarters. And furthermore we're never really introduced to that angry young lieutenant from the first scene, never learn why he hates Cagney so intensely, never learn why WE should have negative feelings about Cagney who seems like a standard issue `love-em-and-leave-em' soldier who'd fallen under the spell of pretty young Calvet. If that angry young lieutenant doesn't get a chance to explain himself he does get to speak the lines in which the play's title is embedded. Cagney's men, rested and brought back up to strength with green recruits - Robert Wagner and others - are back at the front line. They're ordered to capture a German officer for interrogation purposes. Cagney sends out some of the green troops, who don't return. Lieutenant Angry, desperately wounded, writhes on his field sick bed and dares Cagney to capture that German officer himself. It's wordier than that, and a whole lot more serious than the movie prepares us for, and, most importantly, the Lieutenant's rant contains the title of the movie. Heck, we just know Cagney as an aging Lothario, not a mean/vicious/vainglorious/what-have-you commander, and having an overwrought bit player hurl a mouthful of Maxwell Anderson epithets at him is a little much. What price glory, indeed.

What the heck. Reputable sources have it that Ford intended to turn what, I assume, is a Maxwell Anderson anti-war play into a musical. That may not have been such a bad idea. Calvet does sing to the boys in the bar a couple of times, and Wagner gets serenaded by a French girl in a blue beret. The action sequences are bad, the `what price glory' scene is a dud, and generally this one works better when it plays it for comedy rather than drama. WHAT PRICE GLORY isn't an awful movie, especially for those of us who are fans of Cagney and Ford, but it is awfully uneven and static.
November 6, 2006

Wasted Talent

This was a most disappointing movie, considering the cast and director. One can only assume that John Ford was putting most of his energy towards The Quiet Man and not to What Price Glory.

The usual "authenticity" of a John Ford movie was evidently lacking right from the start. When you have marines refer to themselves as "soldiers" it is hard to watch the movie without a great deal of cynicism. The word "soldier" and "army" were bantered about by this group of marines as if they thought they were in the army. I never knew or heard of any marine that would think this way.

The movie seems to ramble without any focus or plot. It appears as if it is a group of individual skits put together and called a movie.

I gave it two stars just because of a great cast. Harry Morgan always contributes solid roles and it is fun to watch a young Robert Wagner. James Cagney is looking his age and not quite credible as a marine who could endure front-line combat.

This movie was well intended, but, as the saying goes, the road to hell is paved with good intentions! December 11, 2004

WHAT PRICE GLORY? - ANY BUT THIS!

"What Price Glory" is a World War I lover's triangle set against the ravaged backdrop of French countryside circa, 1918. Drama aside, the film is not what one might expect from the directorial giant likes of John Ford. James Cagney is a bit over the hill to be believable as Capt. Flagg, a stoic commander of a motley troupe of conscripts. Flagg's ill at ease postulating does not bode well with his men, so he turns to disrespectful and disreputable Sgt. Quirt (Dan Dailey) for a little bit of hard knock military strength. But the tensions between Flagg and Quirt are pressed to the breaking point when they both fall for the same girl - stop me if you've heard this one before. Strong performances elevate this film above the tripe that - generally - it is.
THE TRANSFER: Frankly, not up to snuff. Although the overall color scheme has retained much of its original luster, the picture quality is a disappointment. There is an excessive amount of film grain and age related artifacts throughout for a not very smooth visual presentation. Fluctuations in color balancing are - at times - severe and distracting. There is a minor amount of digital grit that further detracts from the image. Black levels are weak. Contrast and shadow delineation is poorly balanced for a very unstable looking presentation. The audio has been cleaned up but remains strident sounding and lacking in bass. EXTRAS: As with the other war films in this batch from Fox, you get nothing to augment your experience. BOTTOM LINE: "What Price Glory" isn't recommended either as a war film, or for its transfer quality. Seek satisfying your thirst for conquest elsewhere. May 25, 2004

More reviews at Amazon.com ...