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If you have to start a review that way and you rate over 3, then the reviewer isn't much of a critic. I watched NORWAY again last night. I've seen it when originally released in theatres, bought the DVD in a moment of weakness and watched it a 3rd time last night. It was conceived after the rash of 60's roadshow musicals but the production took forever to get moving. Too bad it did. Let's look at the good pieces to the film: 1. The cinematography is breathtaking when you see the fields of flowers, the waterfalls, the snow and ice, the fjords; truly good cinematography. 2. Musical score. The score as performed and recorded is dynamic and powerful. 3. Film editing: for what the editor had to work with, he did a tremendous job. Now lets talk about the weak points: 1. STORY. Unless you're a musician that plays Grieg on a fairly regular basis, you need a powerful story to hold the audience. This is missing. The story that came out (at least this is what I thought) was the love triangle between girl #1 Murstad and Henderson. But, you saw no passion or a hint of love so the story gets lost in the sets. 2. STARS, outside of Henderson, Robinson, and Morley, the rest of the cast is largely unknown-not a detriment if they could act. Henderson does what she can, but her role doesn't lend itself to any powerful scenes. 3. MUSIC. For a musical this film, 1. It has no song that is memorable 2. Has no huge production number 3. Lead actor has no singing voice. Probably would have made a better straight drama. 4. Editing. Unfortunately for it being one of the better parts of the film, it still needs editing. Sad, but if the editor would have been just, this film would have ended up a two reeler short subject. 5. SCREENPLAY. As I said the story is ambiguous, the screenplay is just BORING. By the end of the film, you just don't care what happens to the principles that you watched for 2 1/2 hours - you just want to run run run or take a boat down the fjord to get away with it. I would like to blame all the people involved for this being the film it is, but this really falls on 2 shoulders: Andrew and Virginia Stone. They were the people involved in keeping the talent together and coordinated: they should have pushed harder. Stone went on to create one more film after this: THE GREAT WALTZ - another boxoffice-blunder.

There has been a nuclear world war. The only area left unaffected from nuclear fallout is Austrailia, but the fallout is coming..... A really good film led by an allstar cast. Gregory Peck as the sub commander assigned to Australia having lost his family during the war. Ava Gardner as his love interest. Fred Astaire in a rare dramatic performance. The films main theme is how people that are left from nuclear Armageddon survive. It's a powerful story and well worth watching: This is NOT a film where you'll be singing Waltzing Matilda afterwards: it's a thought provoking film worthing of discussion with friends after.

Right off the bat: I'm spoiled: I grew up on Elizabeth Taylor. The stories are relatively the same '34 is more of a simpler story line and deals more with the romance. '63 deals with the romance, but also brings a perceived history of the events as well. Taylor plays the queen with a regal/straight persona> flawed but my preference. Colbert plays the queen like a giddy school girl>to the detriment of the film. It's like she's trying to be cute - the performance just doesn't ring true to me. Williams Caesar is good and plays well with Colbert, but his assassination was a 20 second scene. I think that's what struck me odd about the whole film = it seemed rushed: hurry up with this scene, move on to the next one. At 100 min, guess it has to be fast at nearly 4 hrs, you can deal with exposition. All technicals are pretty good and, believe, from the shots, you can tell this is a Cecil B DeMille extravaganza.