The Beguiled | | Cast : | Clint Eastwood, Geraldine Page | | Director : | Don Siegel | | Studio : | Universal Studios | | Format : | Color, Closed-captioned, Widescreen, Dolby | | Released Date : | January 01, 1970 | | DVD Released Date : | May 31, 2005 | | Language : | English (Dubbed), English (Subtitled), Spanish (Dubbed), English (Original Language), French (Original Language) | | Audience Rating : | R (Restricted) | | | BUY THIS DVD FROM AMAZON |
Customer Reviews
| Rating |  | | Date | June 09, 2005 | | Summary | the hens show the rooster whose boss. | Content
 | An excellently realised film focusing on that ever so mysterious relations between men and women. Especially those that are tainted by personal gain, manupilation, lies, deceipt, lust, jelousy, revenge and a pile of control issues. This dark, gothic all- girls boarding house is well occupied by the brilliant leads (as well as an outstanding cast of assorted fine young actresses): a very handsome Clint Eastwood ( as a handicapped soldier fresh from battle and eventually a very compromised object of desire) and the rare, unique and gifted Geraldine Page as the ruthless headmistress with some scandalous secrets to hide. Once the lies are discovered , the plot charges dangerously ahead to a wonderfully stunning conclusion that will leave you silent. Fortunately , hollywood hasn't felt the need to refilm this extremely UNDERATED psycho-chiller. |
| Rating | | | Date | April 12, 2005 | | Summary | Great Performances All Around | Content
| Another well done moral ambiguity piece where the anti-hero makes it hard to decide who to root for.
If nothing else "The Beguiled" silenced anyone who said there were no good parts for actresses in movies-at least in 1971. There were four excellent parts for actresses in this film and all were well cast and well executed.
Pamelyn Ferdin did a fine job as Amy and would go on to play "Wanda June". This must have been the first time an adult male box office star shared an extended kiss with a twelve-year-old girl on camera, wonder if there was much controversy about this at the time. It was probably Polanski's favorite scene. Given the fate of Amy's turtle "Randolph", it is no surprise that Ferdin grew up to be a hardcore animal rights activist.
Geraldine Page was likewise excellent, playing a complex character with just the right amount of restraint. It is interesting that she died just three days after Elizabeth Hartman committed suicide (throwing herself through a fifth floor window) as they had also worked together in "You're a Big Boy Now".
Hartman (who looks like she could be Blair Brown's sister) was wonderful as Edwina and should have gotten an Oscar (no other performance was even close that year), but given what we now know about her you wonder just how much of her performance was a studied effort and how much just came from inside her. Edwina shows such raw pain it is difficult to watch. Like Marilyn Monroe's incredible performance in "The Misfits", the viewer is probably seeing a whole lot of her own demons in the character she is playing.
Finally there is Jo Ann Harris who is stunningly perfect as the flirty Carol. For my money Harris was the sexiest actress of the 1970's, combining sensuality with intelligence and humor. She was the best reason to watch the "Most Wanted" television series and the only reason to watch "Wild Wild West Revisited". Hard to believe that someone who could bring all that to the screen never became a big star. |
| Rating | | | Date | March 28, 2005 | | Summary | Southern Gothic Eastwood | Content
| Corperal John McBurny (Clint Eastwood) is a Union soldier who is wounded in battle. He is taken in and nused back to health by the head mistress of a all girl's boarding school (Geraldine Page). As he gets better, the prospects of an all girl enviroment start to occure to him. He begins flirting with all the girls and winning sexual favors from them. But then the table turns when all of them figure out what he's doing and then take out a horrible revenge. This is certainly a strange entry in the Clint Eastwood collection; one that is as wierd as "Tightrope". It is a Edgar Allen Poe-like gothic horror story of insainity, incest, and revenge. Though Eastwood's characters have never been the nicest people, his Cpl. McBurney is a lot more slimy than usual for him. He manipulates all the girls with his advantage of being the olny man around, and then when that stops working he bullies them with a pistol. Page plays a pretty cunning and remorsless villian. Of all of the actors, only Elizabeth Hart's teacher elisets any sympathy; her decleration of love at the end seems more of a ploy to drive McBurny out, a kind of self sacrifice of sorts. I liked the idea of the audience being able to hear what the characters are thinking; and the flash backs to expose McBurney's lies were very insiteful. A good, but different, Eastwood outing. |
| Rating | | | Date | December 31, 2004 | | Summary | A creepy, gothic tale of lust and deception | Content
| "The Beguiled" is one of my favorite Clint Eastwood films, and a departure from his typical early roles. Directed by Don Siegel, with whom Eastwood collaborated on several films, it was made a year before Eastwood's directorial debut with "Play Misty For Me". An alternate title considered for the film was "Pussy-Footing Down At The Old Plantation", which thankfully was not used, otherwise I am sure raunchy jokes about the fact that it takes place at a girls' school would be difficult to avoid. I first saw this movie in one of my college film classes in the mid-1970's, and was immediately taken with it. I only had an old battered VHS tape of it until I recently purchased the widescreen DVD, which also includes the hilarious, awful trailer (which made me laugh out loud, the trailer makes it sound like a "Peyton Place" soap opera, and conveys none of the creepiness of the film).
Eastwood and Siegel had to battle with Universal Pictures to keep the original ending, and they won out. However, the film was billed as a western, which it certainly is not. It is a gothic tale of deception and horror that is set in the time of the Civil War, and an underlying tone of eroticism and sexual tension runs throughout the film.
I'm not putting any spoilers in this review, and if you want to see the film as it should be seen, then be careful of looking this film up on the internet, as spoiler reviews of it do abound.
Clint Eastwood portrays John McBurney, a Union soldier who is shot on Confederate ground and discovered by a young girl from a nearby girls' school. She rescues him and takes him back to the school, but instead of notifying the local patrol of his presence so that he will be taken to prison, the headmistress, Miss Martha (Geraldine Page), her assistant Edwina (Elizabeth Hartman), their black female servant Hallie (Mae Mercer), and the mostly teenage girls take him in, heal him, and fall under his spell. The film sets its tone of creepiness and Gothic horror right from the titles, as it shows real battleground shots from the war, while Eastwood's voice is heard quietly singing a funereal song of the time. The opening scene of his encounter with the little girl who saves him sets the tone of his character, and the tone of the entire movie. To say any more than that would spoil the surprise of their first encounter. To say much more about the film itself might ruin it for anyone who hasn't seen it...if you are into creepy, Gothic horror, find it and rent it. Eastwood is excellent in the film, and it is interesting to see him in an early, or any role, where he portrays a character that is for the most part very unsympathetic.
Geraldine Page had a plum role in the film as the headmistress, I cannot imagine another actress of the time being as good in the role; a long shot could have been Piper Laurie, but I don't think Laurie could have embodied the role in the same manner. Her performance was worthy of an Oscar nomination, IMO.
Elizabeth Hartman (who also did a wonderful performance in the film "A Patch of Blue" as a blind girl who falls in love with Sidney Poiter's character) is at her prime here, delicate and masterful at the same time. Unfortunately, her delicacy on film was also a part of her real life; she committed suicide at a young age, having battled depression on and off throughout her brief, and extremely talented, life.
I end this review with this observation: one manipulative, lying Yankee man is no match for a houseful of deceptive and libidinous Southern belles.
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| Rating | | | Date | November 13, 2004 | | Summary | Wickedly Funny | Content
| I was never really a fan of Clint Eastwood's films but I really liked this one.Its athmospheric and creepy (including that song!) with great performances by all.There are lot's of funny scenes (Clint expalining his ethics and "respect for land"),That little girl saying "why dont we just hang him?",and the girls stitching something at the end of the movie as if theyre in a knitting class.
You wouldnt really root for anybody in this movie.This movie will make you chuckle,this movie will shock you even by today's standard.A little known movie yet highly recommended.Specially if you want something different. |
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