A memorable Best Picture Oscar winner buoyed by several fine performances

Rating: 8/10 (27 August 2010)

Fred Zinnemann's "From Here to Eternity", based on the classic novel of the same name by James Jones, took home the coveted Best Picture Oscar for 1953. It also won seven other Oscars (from thirteen nominations), tying the mark set by "Gone With the Wind" fourteen years earlier.
The story takes place at a U.S. military base in Hawaii in the months preceding the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. There are two main threads to the plot: One centres on a private who's being cruelly treated in an attempt to bend him to the captain's will while the other concerns an affair between the captain's wife and a sergeant. Apart from this there are further sub-plots, which is perhaps unsurprising given the considerable length of the novel. Nevertheless, the script is tight and the screenwriter won an Oscar for his efforts.
The cast is a good one, as evidenced by the five Oscar nominations in the acting categories. Donna Reed and Frank Sinatra both took home Oscars but I feel that the film's other nominees (Montgomery Clift, Burt Lancaster & Deborah Kerr) were actually more deserving. The supporting cast is pretty decent, too, including Ernest Borgnine in his breakout role.
Zinnemann's direction won an Oscar and the film also landed awards for its cinematography & editing. The visuals are consistently attractive and Lancaster & Kerr's scene on the beach is genuinely iconic. The sound also won an Oscar while the score was rewarded with a nomination.
All in all, I think that "From Here to Eternity" was a worthy Best Picture winner. There are some that say that it hasn't aged particularly well but I can't see why they'd say that. As far as I'm concerned, good acting (like that on display here) never goes out of style.