For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943)

Trying to adapt this Ernest Hemingway novel for the screen was always going to be quite an ask, and for me it was just one too much for Gary Cooper - even if the author had written it with him in mind for the role of the intrepid “Jordan”. He is more of an academic rather than a crusader, but he is experienced with explosives, restless and soon finds himself attracted by the Internationals Brigade fighting for the republican cause in the Spanish Civil War. With heavy snow on the ground, he is tasked by their Soviet armourers with working under the audacious “Pilar” (Katina Paxinou) to mine an important bridge which is to be detonated when the Fascists attempt to shift their ordnance across it. Meantime, he encounters the young “Maria” (Ingrid Bergman) who has only recently been a victim of the violence of the Falangists, and so is just as earnest to wreak her own revenge. What now ensues sees this group of partisan resistance fighters skirmish with their foes and also with themselves as the chill of the winter sets in and a romance begins to blossom. Initially their military action proves less successful and with reprisals always on the cards, their coalition of like minded people fractures and “Pablo” (Akim Tamiroff) pinches the detonation equipment. Determined not to fail, “Jordan” concocts a more manual and dangerous way to accomplish his mission - but in executing his plan is injured. Can he still make good on his oath, though? This is a great and characterful story to read, but somehow it loses much of it’s sense of peril here. Possibly because so much of it looks studio shot: the rocks looked as if the snow had been painted onto them and the look of much of this feature suggests indoors with central heating. I didn’t think that Cooper and Bergman gelled at all well and she is as prone to over-acting, especially as we reach the denouement, as he is to some seriously wooden scenes. That matters more when some of the more nuanced and politic dialogue is delivered as if he were reading the phone book and thereby the film is robbed of a large portion of it’s potency. I thought the assemblage of supporting talent, including Vladimir Sokoloff”s “Anselmo” worked better at presenting us with a genuine looking cohort of disparate freedom fighters, but some of the wartime effects looked little better than someone throwing a bag of soot from off-set as this film simply failed to capture the imagination I experienced when reading the book. Did it need to be three hours long? Well yes, I think it did. There is a lot going on here and the story is more than just that of “Jordan” and “Maria”, but as it is delivered here it does feel like a long and meandering watch that lacked sharpness and conviction. Some books are just best left on the page - I think this might be one of them.