gavin6942 Inspired by the scriptural tale. Moabitess priestess Ruth is drawn both to a Judean man and to his talk of a forgiving God. After tragedy strikes, she begins a new life in Bethlehem."The Story of Ruth" received favorable reviews upon release. Variety called it "a refreshingly sincere and restrained Biblical drama, a picture that elaborates on the romantic, political and devotional difficulties encountered by the Old Testament heroine." I like the word "restrained" in that review. Although the overall theme is definitely the promotion of the Judeo-Christian god, especially over false idols, it is never to the point where it seems unbearably preachy. There is much more focus on the love life of Ruth, and the conflict between the two countries, Moab and Judea. It almost makes me want to learn more about the history of Moab and find where it disappeared to.

dbdumonteil The book of Ruth is very short .Hence the necessity for the screenwriters to flesh out her tale ,with varying degrees of success; For instance ,the first part was invented from start to finish.We know nothing of Ruth before she married Naomi's son -in the movie the marriage is not even consummated .Naomi is a priest of a cruel God ,who demands such horrible things as human sacrifice -one of the little girls is immolated before us,a rather unusual scene .And that wicked high priestess Viveca Linfords is making rough all over .It's Mahalon (Tom Tryon) who shows Ruth the straight and narrow and talks to her of the true invisible God .That's a fanciful explanation.Although at the top of the bill,it takes almost an hour before Boaz (Stuart Whitman)appears;once again many events were added:the poisoned source ,Ruth turned away by the woman,and the trial which seems inspired by another biblical episode:Daniel,Suzanne and the two old men who commit perjury and meet the same fate as the one they wanted to inflict on Ruth.All that concerns Boaz is more faithful to the Holy Script ,with the exception of the source:Ruth is allowed to glean in his fields,and the wealthy man protects her.But as far as love is concerned ,Boaz has no rival :no Tob,but Boaz has to buy back Elimelec's parcel (Naomi's husband appears in the first part)from the closest relative who takes off his shoe like we see in the movie.The cast is rather impersonal ;the stand out is certainly Peggy Wood as Naomi,full of compassion,warmth ,tenderness,and a biblical wisdom;her daughter-in -law,on the other hand is a rather static Ruth,and Whitman seems uninspired .A Young student who wants to give an account of the story of Ruth should not go by this movie.It's pure Entertainment,nothing more.

Neil Doyle There's no question that THE STORY OF RUTH would have been a lot more different if it emerged as a Cecil B. DeMille production at the hight of DeMiller's spectacular career at Paramount. I'm sure he would have made certain that the writers expanded on the story to bring as much spectacle and battle scenes as possible in order to bring it up to his usual "sand and sandals" requirements.But Henry Koster has taken a simple story, retained the simplistic values of the plot and made it a moving story of a young woman from a pagan culture who gradually amends her sinful ways and comes to worship only one invisible God. Koster has had wonderful success with his two very rugged looking male stars--TOM TRYON (whose role occupies the first half of the lengthy film, as a Hebrew) and STUART WHITMAN as the man Ruth comes to love. JEFF MORROW is also stalwart and appealing as the man who tries to win her love but fails miserably.Alas, we now come to the real drawback of the film--ELANA EDEN, the unknown actress who plays the all important title role--Ruth, and her acting is, to put it kindly, "limited". In fact, it is only one notch above the kind of grade school emoting we had from Maria Montez during the height of her adventures with Jon Hall and Sabu. Furthermore, while undeniably beautiful in an exotic way, her accent makes much of her dialog in need of the caption feature. Her wooden performance is perhaps the reason for her very brief screen career in what should have been a star-making role.Surprisingly, despite this main drawback, THE STORY OF RUTH has an intelligent script, sensible direction and a warm performance by PEGGY WOOD as Ruth's mother-in-law, Naomi. Miss Wood makes up for the lack of animation in Elana Eden's role.Summing up: Handsomely produced, it's an interesting tale told smoothly without a lot of pomp and circumstance that usually accompanies these sort of Biblical tales. And Franz Waxman's music is stirring.

MARIO GAUCI After having missed out on it several times on Italian TV, I've managed to catch up with this - as it turned out - underrated Biblical epic via Fox's pleasing DVD edition. It's a typically lavish production with a nice Franz Waxman score and a decent cast: unknown Elana Eden makes for a convincing heroine; Tom Tryon is the leading man during the first half (until he is killed off), with Stuart Whitman taking over in the second part of the narrative; Peggy Wood is a dignified Noemi; and Jeff Morrow delivers an amusing performance as a perennially drunk Jewish merchant and Eden's suitor.Not knowing much about the Biblical story, the lengthy expository events - akin to the similarly irrelevant ones (of the young Moses in Egypt) depicted in THE TEN COMMANDMENTS (1956) - were a welcome addition; as a matter of fact, Viveca Lindfors - a strong presence during these early stages - disappears altogether once the scene shifts to Judea! Typical of most epics of the time, the film feels overlong and could do with some trimming - especially in its more reverent second half - but it's one I wouldn't mind owning on DVD, especially if Fox would consider releasing a collection of their Biblical epics (comprising as well David AND BATSHEBA [1951], THE ROBE [1953], DEMETRIUS AND THE GLADIATORS [1954] and THE BIBLE...IN THE BEGINNING [1966]).