Les quatre cavaliers de l'apocalypse

This film has many fine qualities, some oddball aspects, and some things of interest because of how they relate to other work by the creative artists. For example, Minnelli returns to Paris location shooting as he did in 'American in Paris' and 'Gigi', but this time to re-create wartime Paris and what it was like to be part of the Resistance, as well as what life was like among the privileged Parisian collaborators who lived the good life under Nazi rule. In spite of MGM glamour and production values that must have cost a fortune, Minnelli and his screenwriters often succeed in portraying the anguish of that time, the moral crisis of privileged neutrals, and the courage of those who resisted. Credit must go to a splendid cast of Hollywood veterans and some talented newcomers. Paul Henreid shows up playing, what else?, a resistance hero. Ingrid Thulin's Swedish accent must have been too much for MGM's money men - they had her dialogue dubbed by Angela Lansbury, and pretty effectively too. One of the greatest pleasures of the film is Andre Previn's score. If you like your movie music big, complex, intrusive, and romantic, you'll agree that this score is one of the great overlooked gems of Hollywood soundtracks.

What's bad about the movie? Glenn Ford for starters, not too believable as an Argentinian playboy. But that may just be a matter of taste.

Vincente Minnelli's updating of Vicente Blasco Ibanez's novel is an absorbing melodrama which, as another viewer has noted, must have been watched by Visconti before he made his film The Damned a few years later.

The film begins with the Desnoyers family gathering for dinner following the return of Heinrich (Karl Boehm) from a spell in Germany where, to the disgust of grandfather Julio, he has been indoctrinated into the ideology of the Nazi party. The grandfather is played by Lee J. Cobb and it's a blessing that the old boy pegs it during dinner because Cobb not only chews the scenery but the sets and props as well. Despite this, the lines are clearly drawn between the two sides of the family: Heinrich and his father Karl (Paul Lukas) on one side, Julio No' 2 (Glenn Ford) and little sister Chi Chi (Yvette Mimieux) on the other.

Julio is a playboy with no interest in the war; he prowls swish parties for available women, sidling between arguments of the impending war as he closes in on his prey. Sadly, Ford, usually a likable enough leading man, doesn't possess the necessary predatory swagger to pull of the role. In fact, he is so badly miscast that he seems to be adrift throughout the film, as if trying to figure out how he was ever chosen for the role (Minnelli wanted Alain Delon, apparently, and we can only imagine what an altogether different interpretation he would have given to the part).

The predicament in which the Desnoyer family find themselves is wholly absorbing as the war slowly tears its members apart. Most imaginable sea-changes in personal opinions are explored during the course of the story, from the discovery of a hidden integrity on Julio's part, to disillusion on the part of Karl, the WW1 veteran who allows himself to be swept up in the triumphalism of the Nazi's rise only to find his son becoming irrevocably morally corrupted by the same experiences.

The movie never won any awards, which is probably how it should be, but it provides an intelligent and literary exploration of a fascinating subject that makes it easy to watch despite its bloated running time.

If Vincente Minnelli is to be praised in this film, it his decision to film Ibanez' novel and to cast the fascinating Ingrid Thulin--who has contributed substantially to Bergman's early work and to Swedish theatre. No Hollywood actress could have lent credibility to this role as Ms Thulin did. It is a matter of historical tragedy that Thulin's own voice was not used and Angela Lansbury's voice was used instead.

Lee J Cobb as the patriarch and Glenn Ford as Julio were avoidable decisions. However, the casting of Paul Henreid and Charles Boyer enhanced the film.

What made the film rise over mediocrity? The story and Thulin. Ibanez' work is world renowned and film is a beautiful medium to capture the image of the four horsemen. Interestingly Minnelli is not able to capture the "pale" and the "red" horse on screen--the most difficult of the four horses in technicolor and decides to use smoke and clouds to distract us. According to "The Book of Revelations," the horsemen carried a bow, a sword, a balance and a great Sword. Ingmar Bergman in "the Seventh Seal" and Minnelli transforms the great sword into a scythe. But for this detail, the art direction throughout the movie was commendable.

Erich von Stroheim Jr. was a mere Assistant Director in this work. von Stroheim's body of work in Europe is revered today and one can only speculate about the result had he directed the film instead of Minnelli. Minnelli's film has its moments--Etienne meeting his wife on his return from capture, and Etienne's confrontation with Julio. Yet the film is Hollywood's attempt at presenting a narrative without complexity for audiences who prefer to be spoonfed. Ibanez' novel is still waiting for a good director to film--Minnelli stumbled in his effort to create a masterpiece. One mistake he made was choosing Glenn Ford to play an Argentinan playboy. What a costly mistake!

In Argentina, the family man Julio Madariaga (Lee J. Cobb) is the patriarch of his family and considers his farm the paradise on Earth. One of his daughters, Luisa Desnoyers (Harriet MacGibbon), has married the Frenchman immigrant Marcelo Desnoyers (Charles Boyer) and they have one son, the playboy Julio (Glenn Ford), and one daughter, the gorgeous student of Sorbonne Chi Chi (Yvette Mimieux). His other daughter, Elena von Hartrott (Kathryn Givney), has married the German Karl von Hartrott (Paul Lukas), and they have three sons: Heinrich (Karl Boehm), Gustav and Franz.

In 1938, Heinrich returns from Germany for a family reunion and when he tells that he has joined the SS, the displeased Julio Madariaga has a heart attack and dies. When France is occupied by the Germans, the family reunites in Paris and Franz is the Nazi administrator in France. The alienated Julio has a studio where he paints, and has a love affair with Marguerite Laurier (Ingrid Thulin), the wife of the owner of a newspaper Etienne Laurier (Paul Henreid) that is fighting in Belgium. Meanwhile Chi Chi joins the French resistance and is arrested. Julio uses the influence of his uncle Franz to release her. However, Chi Chi has an argument with Julio for his neutral position. When Chi Chi is tortured to death by Gestapo, Julio joins the resistance, using his relationship with the Germans to get inside information.

"The 4 Horsemen of the Apocalypse" is an epic romance with the awakening of a playboy in times of war. The cinematography, art direction and costumes are amazing, but unfortunately the screenplay is shallow and the film is miscast in the lead role. Glenn Ford is never convincing as a French-Argentinean, and too old (46 years old) to be a playboy and son of Charles Boyer (63 years old). Further, it is ridiculous the actors and actresses speaking in English forcing accents in French, German and Spanish. I have never had the chance to see the 1921 original film to compare with this remake by Vincente Minnelli. My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "Os Quatro Cavaleiros do Apocalipse" ("The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse")

A film that's always been held in a great deal of affection here in Spain (and not just because it's a Blasco Ibañez story, nor because hearing it dubbed into Spanish relieves us of Angela Lansbury). As far as I'm concerned, and pace the other reviewers, Glenn Ford's utterly convincing portrayal of Julio is by far the best thing about it. So what if he's a bit long in the tooth? a great many real-life playboys are, and his maturity makes the romantic dilemmas posed by the plot all the more poignant. From start to finish he's seriously, dangerously likeable, which he certainly needs to be in order to win the love of a beautiful, intelligent and patriotic Frenchwoman over her heroic Resistance husband. The romance actually convinces, against the odds, and saves a movie that might otherwise easily have been a ghastly flop.

After all, what else is there? Andre Previn's music is impressively dramatic but there is a worrying lack of restraint in the score, both in the overblown intro and the pretty but intrusive "love theme" cue, complete with solo violin, which insists on being heard every time the hero and heroine so much as glance at one another. The "four horsemen" vision manages to stay just this side of Monty Python (with the aid of swirling clouds), but doesn't save the opening scenes of the film from lurching full-pelt into overplayed melodrama (the death of the patriarch Madariaga: one too many thunderclaps for a start), and doesn't tie in too well with what was eventually left in from Blasco Ibañez's tale (pestilence? famine? where?). The plot is 100% predictable, and the rest of the acting is competent without being memorable.

I must admit, though, I was impressed by the very Minnelli-esque sequence which took Ford's eyes staring at a scene of dancing and frivolity between Nazi officers and collaborationist women, superimposing the two and mixing in newsreel-style war footage; likewise, Henreid's heartstopping portrayal, in one scene, of a man almost broken by torture, emerging from a Gestapo jail; and the finely judged acceleration at the end towards the story's predictable but satisfying climax. Not a film I will want to make a habit of seeing, but would certainly stand a second and maybe even a third viewing.