A classic drama, with a superb performance from Montgomery Clift

Rating: 9/10 (18 February 2019)

"From Here to Eternity" is the first movie I have seen in which Montgomery Clift plays a lead role. And what an introduction. Clift is superb in this movie, and certainly deserved the Oscar he was nominated for but did not win.
I knew, going in, that the movie is set in the days before the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. I did not know that it also contained a drama so well acted that I would forget about that climactic event. The movie grabbed me from the beginning and wouldn't let go. I didn't care about the bombs and the planes and the kamikaze.
Until they attacked. That has to be one of the best scenes of air-to-ground warfare I have seen in a movie.
The movie is also notable for making a star out of Frank Sinatra, and that's nowhere near as bad as it sounds. Old Blue Eyes was no Elvis Presley: he could act as well as sing.
Also, be on the lookout for that amazing actor, Ernest Borgnine. Who other than Borgnine could play a truly psychopathic bad guy - evil incarnate - as he does here, but also turn in a performance as a loveable lug, like he did in "Marty"?
I have to admit though, the romantic subplot with Burt Lancaster kind of left me cold, but I think that's just me. I've never been one for romance.