The Red Badge of Courage (1951)

Best movie of this year hands down!

Crappy film

I really wanted to like this movie. I feel terribly cynical trashing it, and that's why I'm giving it a middling 5. Actually, I'm giving it a 5 because there were some superb performances.

A film of deceptively outspoken contemporary relevance, this is cinema at its most alert, alarming and alive.

One of the best movies I've ever seen! It showed true faith in troubling times, and shows how someone can come from running away to a true figure of courage! I totally recommend this movie to anyone! It really showed me what it takes to rise and overcome your fears

"The Red Badge of Courage," Stephen Crane's classic novel about combat during the American Civil War, should have been a memorable movie when you consider the abundance of talent involved in its production. John Huston was a cinematic craftsman who had proved his talent many times over with "The Maltese Falcon," "Across the Pacific," "The Treasure of Sierra Madre," "Key Largo," "The Asphalt Jungle," and his immortal World War II documentaries "San Pietro" and "Let Their Be Light." Audie Murphy had fought in World War II and if anybody knew anything about the rigors as well as the horrors of war, this Medal of Honor recipient should have known. The seasoned cast consists of a number of first-rate character actors, among them Andy Devine, Royal Dano, William Schallert, Robert Easton Burke, Whit Bissell, Arthur Hunnicutt, Tim Durant, and John Dierkes. "Wizard of Oz" lenser Harold Rossen's cinematography is outstanding, especially the close-ups of the Union troops and the shots of sunlight streaming through trees. Clocking in a 69 meager minutes, "The Red Badge of Courage" lacks any sense of substance. Granted, this is a simple tale told from the ankles up of the soldiers in the ranks as they march into combat. You won't find any expository scenes of generals and their adjutants hunched over tables in lantern lit tents discussing strategy. Nevertheless, this movie is just plain lacking. You don't experience the horrors of war, and the battle scenes seem tame. Some of the dialogue is amusing, but Huston seems to have made a movie with battle scenes but no plot. Basically, what we have here is a routine Civil War movie. Stephen Crane painted his novel with colorful prose that doesn't translate well as a black & white film. Such as shame.

The Red Badge of Courage is directed by John Huston who also co-adapts to screenplay with Albert Band from the novel of the same name written by Stephen Crane. It stars Audie Murphy, Bill Mauldin, Andy Devine, Robert Easton, Douglas Dick, Royal Dano, Arthur Hunnicutt and Tim Durant. Music is by Bronislau Kaper and cinematography by Harold Rosson. The American Civil War and Union soldiers head South to confront the Confederate army. Young Henry Fleming (Murphy) is ill prepared for the horrors of war, so when the crunch comes he retreats from the first battle he's faced with and has a life choice of either being known as a coward, or find something from within to make him strong enough to return to the front line. Nutshell History Of The Production. John Huston believed that this could have been his masterpiece, but an MGM power struggle saw the film butchered. A narration was insisted upon after poor test screenings, Huston washed his hands off the picture, while Lillian Ross produced a critically acclaimed book about the production. With no fanfare or bunting put out by the studio to promote the picture, the eventual 70 minute cut of the movie flopped as audiences didn't quite like the tonal flows of the piece. Over time, even in its truncated form of just under 70 minutes, pic has garnered praise to become something of a classic as it stands, while also being considered as a lost masterpiece due to the cut material apparently being lost forever. Beautifully photographed by Rosson, it's a film that has often been tagged as some sort of arty exercise. Yet it never once feels like it has ideas above its station, it quite simply is a very intimate and touching portrayal of Americans fighting Americans. It doesn't soft soap anything, deftly imbuing the narrative with the awfulness of the war and the effect on those wearing the uniforms. The period design is superb, the battle sequences crafted with great skill by Huston, and in Murphy the pic has a great fulcrum for youthful confusion acted with a skill that many still think he didn't have. Up close and personal, with raw emotional seeping from its pores, The Red Badge of Courage is a potent exercise in war film making. As Audie stands there at culmination of battle charge, holding in his hands the battered flags of both the Union and the Confederacy, the impact is quite something to behold. 8.5/10

The US Civil War brought forth many great novels, treatises and good films. The Red Badge Of Courage depict as the war as it seems to be in real - dusty, horrifying, bloody, not picturesque, grim, deadly and painfully average. People on both sides murder one another at a steady pace, and this is shown very well. The battle scenes are very dry, as was intended, here lies no romanticism, no grandeur, no show - just a grim work of death, some hustle, some cowardice, some bravery as shown in the slow development of the main hero, The Youth. His slow growth from a cowardly youngster to a mature hero is so real, so painfully true. Deaths are all around, and bullets zip, and shells explode - he stands up and he becomes a man. This is shown very well, and this short, but great movie manages to show and deliver one main point - there is nothing beautiful in any war/ Recommended