The Angel Wore Red (1960)

So much average

Sadly Over-hyped

It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.

"The Angel Wore Red" is a 1960 film that takes on the subject of the Spanish Civil War. It stars Dirk Bogarde, Ava Gardner, Joseph Cotten, Vittorio de Sica, and Finlay Currie. The Spanish Civil War is not an easy subject and unfortunately, the film only partially succeeds with Nunnally Johnson's script and under his direction.A priest, Arturo Carrera (Dirk Bogarde) gives up the priesthood just as the war is starting and finds himself on the run from the Spanish Republicans, who accused the priests of indoctrinating their followers against them. Arturo slips into a cabaret in order to hide and meets Soledad (Gardner), an entertainer. Eventually, he falls for her, and both of them wind up being arrested. Meanwhile, both sides are searching for a sacred relic that is believed to have miraculous powers - it is said to have helped defeat Napoleon. The Bishop entrusted it to someone before the cathedral was destroyed. Each side wants it for its own reasons.This is a very dark film - darkly photographed, and the sound is strange. I am glad someone else mentioned that it seemed as if it was dubbed. I could easily believe it was in Italian originally and dubbed in English, though that wasn't the case. The acting is excellent. Movie priests always look so darn good - Bogarde makes a handsome, romantic and gentle priest and gives a dynamic performance as a man who hasn't lost his faith in God, only in the church as a way to serve man. Ava Gardner is well cast. Some comments state she was "past it" etc. - though she looks older than Bogarde, which really doesn't make any difference, she also looks appropriate for the role she plays - Spanish, someone who's been around the block more than once, likes the nightlife and is not wealthy. She is not particularly well photographed, and in spots where she is, it's obvious that her beauty hasn't faded. All anyone has to do is see her in 1964's "Night of the Iguana" to realize what great beauty she still had. Vittoria di Sica plays General Clave; it's an odd performance, which is fitting because the man he plays is odd. Joseph Cotten to me is completely wasted as a news journalist in this movie and seems just inserted into the film. He's excellent, but the performance comes from nowhere.In the end, "The Angel Wore Red" doesn't give us much understanding of the conflict, and the viewer feels almost as if he or she is entering in the middle of something. We're actually entering in the beginning of the Spanish Civil War, but nothing leads us up to it. Props to Johnson, however, for taking on such a weighty subject.

Though far from perfect, I could watch this movie again, and perhaps even more than that. It's a fascinating movie, for one thing, pairing two of the most beautiful people who ever lived, in a story with real depth, or at least the promise of real depth, which says a lot in a world where 99 movies out of 100 don't even try. Imagine, complaining that at 37, Ava Gardner was "past her prime." It is wonderful to see Bogarde, whose roles usually had him sneering worldly-wise ironies, showing heartfelt passion for the good and the true. It is equally wonderful to see Gardner in a role far more suited for her than the calculating charmer or the tormented playgirl. She never seemed to be really trying until this one, where perhaps the part touched something deep in her. Their chemistry was superlative, their love scene one of the greats of all time, in my view. That this portrayal of a love that goes beyond time and place occurs in the context of one of the most astonishingly wicked and absurd wars of all time is another sublimity that seems to have whizzed right by all but one of the previous reviewers. Hemingway showed only that Robert Jordan thought the war was absurd, he didn't show its absurdity, which director Nunnally Johnson managed to do here in both direction and dialog, and against great odds. Like another of my favorites, Viva Zapata, this movie is a flawed masterpiece, better by far than 100 polished banalities. Blame its flaws on the trials of filming in 1960 (still stuck in the 50s), on sloppy editing, on the meaningless title, and the inevitable hurdles that writers and directors have to overcome in the complicated and difficult art of film-making, truly daunting in the case of this film. (Imagine attempting to film a love story between a priest and a prostitute in 50s Sicily?!) Don't blame the the actors, the director, or the beautiful and poignant story.

Despite some obvious flaws I regard this film as a major achievement. The first obvious problem is the dubbing. Vittorio De Sica, a great actor is dubbed in English by a run of the mill voice over technician. The film suffers from being a joint Anglo/American- Italian production.But it is one of the most mature treatments of a political historical theme that I have ever seen. Neither the loyalists nor the Franco led rebels are spared. Both are essentially brutal totalitarians. The Catholic Church is not spared either. Churchmen are showed to be so out of touch with their flock as to be almost comical, and yet when finally knocked off their pedestal they recover their Christianity. Dirk Bogard gives a subtle and brilliant performance as the tortured young priest. Ava Gardner is perfect as the cynical and yet innocent prostitute. It is actually to her advantage that she played this role at 37 rather than ten years earlier. She would simply been too overpoweringly beautiful to have been fully creditable in the part. Aldo Frabrizzi's part may be too reminiscent of his role in Open City especially at the end. Vittorio De Sica seems to have been doing an imitation of Claude Raines in Casablanca. It would have been good to have heard those two great actors in their native Italian. Joseph Cotton as the one eyed jaded reporter gives a broad yet compelling interpretation. The films failings pale in comparison to its overriding importance.

This film has an abiding place in my film canon, for one very good reason.It isn't a great film, as both the other IMDb reviewers have gone out of their way to stress (although some of their criticisms were a little unfair. I thought, for example, that Joseph Cotten fared better than they say). However, it is virtually the only entertainment vehicle I have ever seen - including film, TV, radio, newspaper, magazine - that dares to show the truth about the left-wing Republicans/anti-Nationalists in the Spanish Civil War.The Spanish Republicans have been lionised for decades for their allegedly heroic struggle against fascism (although it is actually a moot point to what extent Franco's Nationalists were fascist). However, this film is brave enough to show the truth - that the Spanish Republicans singled out religious targets and many harmless middle class targets and killed or persecuted them. It also dares to show the truth that the Republicans ran the areas they controlled along Stalinist lines. Which is not surprising, given the links with Communists and Stalinist Russia that some of them had.The file deserves enormous credit for showing this, and it is a shame that no-one has pointed this out on IMDb - until now.