La lunga linea grigia

This movie is one of John Ford's best. I have seen this movie many times, and it only improves with age. A truly heart warming story of a man who came from Ireland and found a new home at West Point, home of our oldest Military Academy. If you like tradition and biographies, this movie is one that you can't help but to love. The only bad thing about the movie is that it is not shown enough and doesn't get the credit it deserves.

First of all, I must admit I am biased. My mom went to college with Marty Maher's niece, Maggie. However, as another reviewer pointed out, this is John Ford at his best, with Tyrone Power playing the part of John Wayne.

Although I do like Wayne, this part called for a better actor, and Ford cast Power brilliantly.

I also can usually smell bad Irish accents from miles off (don't get me started on all of those awful 'irish spring' commercials), but Power sounds like Frank McCourt was coaching him.

The main points of the story are fact based, but some of the events at the end were rearranged to flow better in the movie.

Overall, for John Ford fans, this one is a 'don't miss'!

I am a third year (Cow) cadet at West Point, and everything in this movie inspired me to start my West Point career. Witnessing the writer's and director's portrayal of the bonding and life of Cadets and Officers was quite moving for me. I Recommend this movie to any patriot or full blooded American who is proud of their heritage. This movie will return anyone to their American Roots. Too often we lose the correlation and connection between the nation and its military.

Sergeant Martin Maher is in to see President Eisenhower who he knew back in the day when Ike was a West Point Cadet. The army wants to mandatorily retire him. So as Marty pleads his case before the country's most famous West Point Graduate, we're flashed back to the day as a fresh Irish immigrant he arrives at West Point to work as a waiter in their mess.

And the rest of the film is taken up with the telling of Martin Maher's remarkable story which he wrote in a book entitled Bringing Up the Brass on which this film is based. The subject is a can't miss project for John Ford with two of his dearest loves involved, Irish and military tradition.

Tyrone Power who had played in lots of costume pictures as the dashing hero at his home studio of 20th Century Fox, got a chance to do a real character part here. His skill as a player makes us completely believe that he ages during the film from his twenties to his seventies. Of course makeup helped, but I doubt if certain actors could have brought it off.

Maureen O'Hara matches Power equally as Mary O'Donnell the fresh and fiery colleen who marries him. Her relationship with John Ford as she tells in her recent memoirs had its ups and downs, but she respected his talent and gives one of her best acted roles. And O'Hara adored Tyrone Power, she says of him he was a tease at times, loved to play practical jokes, but a fine man and a thorough professional at his job.

The supporting cast is the usual familiar faces in a John Ford production. I would have to single out Ward Bond as the head of West Point's Athletic Department who Power goes to work for as the best of the group. Also note Donald Crisp as Power's father, one of Crisp's best screen parts.

Tyrone Power was very proud of this film, it was a personal favorite and he and John Ford wanted to work together again. They did, but only with Power's voice providing the narration for an anthology film of three Irish stories in The Rising of the Moon in 1957. Tyrone Power's sudden and tragic death in 1958 put an end to what might have been a great actor/director collaboration.

At the beginning of the flashback, Power tells the actor playing Ike that it took him forty years or so to get the hang of the army. At the end he says that now everything he's ever known and loved is in that institution known as West Point. As Power says it, I defy anyone to remain dry eyed.

You could call "The Long Grey Line" an affectionate tribute by one American institution to another: John Ford to West Point. All the Fordian elements, unashamed sentimentality, boisterious comedy, stark tragedy, are all here, and Ford and his actors convey them all beautifully.

And what actors! Tyrone Power finally proved that he could act in his moving portrayal of Martin Maher, a real-life West Point legend who started out as a fresh-off-the-boat waiter and wound up as the Academy's much-venerated Master of the Sword. Maher died in 1961 at age eighty-four, just as an era he represented was dying, too. Maureen O'Hara gives her usual strong portrayal as his devoted wife, likewise Donald Crisp as his father. Two of the most beloved members of the Ford stock company are here, too. Ward Bond playes Captain Koehler, the previous Master of the Sword who takes young Martin under his wing. And Harry Carey, Jr. has a good spot as the young Dwight Eisenhower, who was going bald even then and trying to stop it with hair-restorer.

A military "Goodbye, Mr. Chips" this may be, but as a heartfelt, human tribute to the Point and the men who made it, as well as good, overlooked Ford, this film is a hidden treasure.