ianlouisiana ......................otherwise "The Young Lions" is in danger of being the cinematic equivalent of "Hamlet",a film,if you like,full of quotations. It is certainly full of scenes that have become over - familiar with the passing of sixty years and being the victim of innumerable "hommages" or blatant plagiarism in many cases. Mr M.Brando's archetypal blond S.S. officer is still being parodied today as is Mr M.Clift's turn as a peace - loving Jew facing prejudice from his own countrymen. Mr D.Martin sadly became a parody of himself a few years down the line but had a hell of a good time doing it. Mr Brando loved an accent all his career and has a glorious opportunity for conveying that rara avis a sensitive and decent German officer who abhors the more appalling excesses of his fellows. I sat in "The Essoldo" Brighton and was nearly blown out of my seat in the scene where Brando escapes in the desert on a motor - cycle and the full sounds of battle erupted all around me.It may not have been stereophonic - but it was amazing for the time and is my abiding memory of a film that set the pace for a hundred lesser productions.

mwm-5 I saw The Young Lions when I was 18 years old, the year it came out. I went into the theater a college kid from Texas who totally bought the swagger of American war heroes. I came out of the film absolutely devastated -- and decided I was now a pacifist and would dedicate my life as an artist to living up to the high standards of this film.All the acting is extraordinary -- Cliff is at his very best, Dean Martin is a surprising revelation playing a dissolute Broadway star he was perfect for. Maximilian Schell is amazing -- I don't know how he wasn't given an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. Barbara Rush, Hope Lange and May Britt are all indelible portraits of the three faces of 40's women.The cinematography is black and white at its best, sharp elements of chiaroscuro unmatched by color films. The musical score is on a level with Holst's The Planets, unrelenting and devastating.But the outstanding feature of the film is the incandescent performance by Marlon Brando at the peak of power as an actor. I don't think I had ever tried to imagine how the Third Reich came to be and how it might have affected a normal German citizen until Brando's brilliant work illuminated it for me. He is at his most handsome, obviously in great shape inside that tailored uniform, and truly epitomizes the "Golden God of War" who is enlightened by the horror he is expected to deliver, and is transformed into a tragic figure.This is as good as Saving Private Ryan or Schindler's List -- one of the most neglected masterpieces of American cinema: a Greek tragedy of our own era.

eminem_sm After the book I became very sad when I was watching the movie. I am agree that sometimes a film should be different from the original novel but in this case it was more than acceptable. Some examples:1) why the ranks are different (e.g. Lt. Diestl instead of Sergeant etc.)2) the final screen is very poor and makes Diestl as a soldier who feds up himself and wants to die. But it is not true in 100%. Just read the book. He was a bull-dog in the last seconds as well. He did not want to die by wrecking his gun and walking simply towards to Michael & Noah. So this is some kind of a happy end which does not fit at all for this movie.

Robert J. Maxwell This film would be outstanding if only because it brought together three actors whose talent was unimpeachable -- Marlon Brando as the idealistic but ultimately disillusioned German lieutenant, Montgomery Clift as the wimpy but spunky Jewish GI, and Maximilian Schell as the ruthless, professional but not entirely unsympathetic German officer. Brando and Clift were both a bit past their prime, displaying mannerisms that would become habitual, and both were a bit old for their parts. Brando spends most of his time towards the end glowering. And Clift has the Make Up Department pin his ears outward, giving him and his already ruined face an outlandish prospect. But, man, can these boys act! Schell came into his own with superb performances in later, sometimes regrettable films like "Judgment at Nurenberg." But even in small roles, as in "The Freshman," he was a constant delight on the screen.The rest of the cast is up to professional standards. May Britt looks like some kind of Aryan predatory animal. (Yum.) Dean Martin established his acting career with this movie, after his split with Jerry Lewis. He could always be relied upon to play Dean Martin, though never memorably, his talents best suited to light comedy rather than dramatic parts. Here, he's a coward who, after a multitude of tergiversations, finally makes an existential decision prompted by Barbara Rush.There are, almost of necessity, romances involving the three principals -- Brando meets a French girl who despises Germans but comes to sympathize with his increasing despondency. I didn't find Francoise particularly appealing. She seemed to enjoy her exuberant attacks on Brando's character a little too much. And she's groomed a la gamin, petite, girlishly cruel voice, big black eyes with furry lashes, and short, curly black hair. Needs a good spanking if you ask me. Dean Martin does everything possible to avoid the Army and, after that fails, to avoid combat. Barbara Rush is his conscience as well as his main squeeze among what we take to be many.The love story involving Clift and Hope Lange is actually touching and even moving at times. It probably wouldn't be, except that Clift is SO homely, helpless, and needy, and Lange is SO bluntly candid and conventionally beautiful with her long blond hair and ski-slope nose. I felt deeply sympathetic for Clift's character when he accompanies Lange home to Brooklyn by means of a combination of bus, subway, and walking -- and then finds himself lost in the middle of the night. I had an almost identical experience, took her back to the hushed streets of Brooklyn after midnight. It was four hours before I reached my own home, less than 20 miles away in a Newark suburb. And if anyone had told me I'd be acting in two movies with Hope Lange years later, I'd have found it amusing.I wish there had been more combat scenes because the director, Dmytryk, handles them pretty well. I honestly don't think we need the dreary scenes at the concentration camp. They've become an unpleasant cliché. Even worse is when the German mayor of the nearby town objects to the Rabbi holding services for the now-liberated Jewish inmates and is thrown out by the Americans. It's insulting when writers treat the viewers like idiots.At that, though, I have to say the writers have made the characters a little more nuanced that they were in the novel, in which the Brando character was an unrepentant and cold-blooded stereotypical Nazi from beginning to end, as if Irwin Shaw were getting his revenge against the Aryans, right down to the character's name -- Christian.Finally, I don't know how anyone can watch Montgomery Clift in this film without noticing the similarities between his treatment by anti-Semites in basic training and the treatment of Clift's character in "From Here to Eternity."