Evening star., 1943-09-16

Bell Tolls" is q dramatic narrative
which sustains itself for hour.
and A minutes, as severe a tes
of merit as Director Sam Wooc
could set for himself.
ViSually 8 beautiful thing tc
see, 1t has the further assets oi
fidelity to the original, some of the
finest acting Of the season, and the
ability to hold the attention through
many passages where philosophy
pushes action into oblivion. The
latter was the chief flaw of Hem
ingway's novel. 1t is also that OF the
Paramount. animation with Gary
Cooper and Ingrid Bergman in the
principal parts. incidentally, while
Miss Bergman is an ideal Maria, she
is challenged every step of the way
through the picture by the magni-
ficent portraits of Pillar and Pablo
by Katina Paxinou and AKIN Tamil
rolf, respectively.
Hemingway's novel has been
treated with complete respect, per-
haps too much for the celeritous
movement OF the screendrama, in
Dudley Nichols adaptation. AS in
the original. it is the story of a
handful of Spanish Loyalists (called
Republicans) involved in a tragic,
futile, but noble mountain battle
with the forces of Gen. Francisco
Franco. They are an arresting
group Of people, who prefer death
to Fascism. But they are not pre-
sented as democratic people in
the black and white of the average
author, for when the aggregate of
brutality is added up at the end.
the Loyalists are no better than
their Fascist foes. They are all
Spaniards and Mr. Hemingway and
Paramount would have you know
he found even the best of them
cruel as well as noble and fiercely
idealistic.
For Whom the Bell Tolls" is set
In some of the most majestic noun
tain scenery ever photographed in
technicolor. Against this dramatic
background, the tale of love and
war can afford to dawdle through
numerous moments of philosophic
discourse which might seem inter-
minable were they less handsomely
staged and less effectively acted.
There are to be found principally
In the expository passiges in which
Hemingway elaborately draws the
characters of his Spaniards. He is
in no hurry to get on with the bridge
blowing project until his gallery of
portraits is fixed indelibly in the
mind. With Miss Bergman's in
spired aid, he shows you Maria, the
girl who could make an exalted love
out of the most debasing of expert
ences. He gives you, in Cooper,
drawing American, who is hardly 8
great lover and too inarticulate to
put his idealiSm into words, but who
seeks to demonstrate it in action.
Then, there are Pillar, the ugly
woman with the great passions, the
fierce matriarch who finds all men
the children that she never had; and
Pablo. the cunning, crafty, oppor-
tunistic. wavering revolutionist who
never could rise beyond his selfish
ness. And Anselmo, the rebel Ct the
gentle heart and great courage, the
hot-headed augistin and Ell Sordo.
the magnificent old warrior who
rellshed death In q great cause.
* II X
The slowly flowing story is almost
literally reproduced in the movement
OF these characters. Director Wood
takes great pains to tell the love
story almost word for word as 1t
came from the typewriter of the
author. He juggles 1t in but one de-
tail, the chronology OF the famous
sleeping bag scene, which is handled
more delicately than evasively. In
this area Of the action, the depth of
the emotion is much more intimated
by Miss Bergman than by Cooper