Der alte Mann und das Meer

I watched the Old Man and the Sea at school for English and I thought it was okay. The plot seems real enough but there is fault in the characters. I read the book and expected that they would make changes, so finding that the old man had a daughter was not a shock to me, but her bad acting contributed to reason this movie was not such a hit. Also Santiago was supposed to be Cuban yet this actor's accent was horrible and he wasn't Cuban. I even heard that he was a famous actor back then and that is why he got the part. Some of the flashbacks were also not in the book which I understand but some had nothing to do with the plot of the story. Santiago was supposed to dream of lions on the beach but instead he dreams of his youth. There were also some good points though, the actor who played Santiago was very good and so was the boy also adding the author of the book into the movie was genius. The big blue marlin at some point looked fake, and the background of the sea, also fake. The scenery of the beach was beautiful though, and it kind of reminded me of my home country. In book and movie, Santiago shows the endurance courage and compassion for the fishes he catches and that is probably what drew people to watch it the first time but know it is not all that popular anymore and would not be a good choice to pick if you wanted to see a good movie. For ratings I would give this movie a four out of ten for good effort even though it really did suck.

We watched The Old Man in the sea in English I really did like the movie. There were a lot of good parts. For example when the sharks started attacking the marlin and Santiago was defending the marlin. The book was really different movie because in the movie he had a daughter and the book didn't. There were some parts that were like told over and over again. Also some of the scenes really looked fake like when the marlin jumped out and when the sharks attacked. Also when the sharks came it looked like it was cut out of another movie and put in. But other wise it was really good and there was scenes of Cuba and those were really good parts. Comparing them both I liked the book because it was really detailed and interesting. Also when there was shark coming they said that he caught it but he really didn't. I have seen a lot of parts in the story that were put into the movie. It was really suspenseful at times like when he was attacking the sharks and when he trying to catch the marlin. At times it was really boring and then like after awhile it got rally good again. Over all I thought it was really good, but it was really short and that at the end it didn't make senses. It should have gone on longer then it would make a lot more sense. I would've liked to see when he went to see his grandchildren and how life went for him after the two day journey. I think that people would enjoy it better and people would gave the movie a lot more stars. Over all I would give this movie 6 stars because the way the move came out.

madkeithdog

Anthony Quinn makes a much better Santiago than Spencer Tracey did, and director Jud Taylor and screenwriter Roger Hirson manage to make the right decisions regarding editing and plot, distilling Hemingway's simple, powerful, story to its fundamental human elements and adding elements of characterization which a more 'faithful' adaptation would have missed.

It is remarkable that this film was made for television broadcast. It sports a cast and a pedigree well above the typical TV movie of its time, and - with a little more budget - would have made a fine big screen film.

Santiago is an old man in a small fishing village in Cuba. Some of the local men feel that his failure to catch fish for the last 84 days has brought a curse on the village, and they long for his retirement. Others, including Santiago himself, simply believe that he has had a run of bad luck. Inspired by a young man who worships the kindly old fishermen, a respectful innkeeper, and indirectly, by the sympathetic sentiments of a foreign writer (Tom Pruitt played by Gary Cole) staying in the village, Santiago begins what may be his final voyage out to sea, in search of a big catch.

Hemingway's story is one of many where the great writer expounds on his unusually sensitive and intelligent views of masculine ideals. In this adaptation of The Old Man and the Sea, however, Hemingway's tendency to diminish female roles in order to make room for men - thankfully - does not come through. Instead, the production team decided to add relationships (such as Santiago and his daughter) which nicely embellish the development of the central character as a passionately independent man who nonetheless loves those around him despite their refusal to understand him (except for his protégé, the young fisherman). The film also nicely touches on issues of aging.

Tom Pruitt (Gary Cole), is - basically - Hemingway. And this character interprets the old man for us, but subtly, and only as he learns from the example the old man sets - never as an omniscient god-figure who creates and sees clearly. As such, Pruitt and his lover (Patricia Clarkson) reveal something intimate about Hemingway's famously tortured relationship with his craft.

The story is shot and edited exactly as it should have been, and the feeling of Hemingway's story is much better developed than in the previous Oscar winning Spencer Tracey version. This is true despite the fact that Taylor's film strays much further from the original Hemingway story.

The film depicts a man struggling with the sea, a crisis of self-confidence, and accusations of uselessness - but who never once loses sight of his prospects and inner strength. The dignity of the character is very admirable, and Anthony Quinn's performance is mesmerizing. Quinn pours his soul into Santiago - and it is clear that the great actor understood his character perfectly. Excellent support is provided by Patricia Clarkson and a very good but largely unknown Latin American cast) Unfortunately, Gary Cole's portrayal of Hemingway is not one of his better efforts and some of his scenes are unconvincing.

Recommended for Hemingway and Quinn fans - but not for purists. Recommended for patient fans of human drama. Not recommended for people with limited attention spans.

I never read the book until I was in my 60's. Hemingway did an excellent writing of the book. I next watched the 1990 version of the movie with Anthony Quinn. He did a fantastic job along with the writers. Books and movies aren't made like these classics. If you haven't read the book, or even watched the 1990 version or the 60's version with Spencer Tracy, you should treat yourself to it. I also have listened to the audiobook version with Donald Sutherland as narrator. I believe the 1990 version with Quinn is the more realistic version since he is Mexican-American and his version is more like Hemingway's Old Man. Treat yourself with this book/movie.

Not much actually happens in this movie: an old man Santiago (Anthony Quinn) has not caught a fish in over eighty trips, goes out for one last trip and catches a huge fish. By doing so, he discovers, perhaps for the first time, the insignificance of human beings in the overall scheme of things. It is a testament to Anthony Quinn's performance in the central role that our interest is sustained; his range of facial expressions is positively wondrous, especially when alone on the boat with no one but himself to talk to. Director Jud Taylor also works hard to develop the spring-and-autumn relationship between Santiago and the boy Anderez (Paul Calderon), which prompts the old man to consider his own behavior as an old men when he believed that he was virtually impregnable. The story has a Hemingwayesque figure in the form of Tom Pruitt (Gary Cole), a writer who cannot leave Santiago's small community until he has discovered for himself just what motivates the old man. This role is a little superfluous, but at least shows why the author himself was interested in such an apparently insignificant story.