The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse * (1962, Glenn Ford, Ingrid Thulin, Charles Boyer) – Classic Movie Review 9301

Director Vincente Minnelli comes a cropper with this stilted 1962 remake of the 1921 Rudolph Valentino silent classic The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. The good star cast of Glenn Ford (as Julio Desnoyers), Ingrid Thulin, Charles Boyer, Lee J Cobb, Paul Henreid, Yvette Mimieux, Paul Lukas and Karl Boehm [Karlheinz Böhm] is all too obviously struggling with the material.

John Gay’s screenplay updates the story of Vicente Blasco Ibáñez’s World War One-set romantic novel from its proper place in World War One to World War Two wartime France.

There a family is at war with itself after patriarch Julio Madariaga (Lee J Cobb) shuffles off this mortal coil. One of his daughters is married to a Frenchman while the other is married to a German, as the Nazis occupy France and the family reunites in Paris.

The public didn’t buy this indigestible mix of escapist adventure and war drama, and those few who came mostly laughed at the drippy dialogue, with the very good acting and directing talent in trouble, as well as the script-writers. It was an expensive critical and financial flop for MGM.

Rather bizarrely, Ingrid Thulin as Marguerite Laurier was dubbed by Angela Lansbury.

Also in the cast are Kathryn Givney, Marcel Hillaire, George Dolenz, Harriet E MacGibbon, Stephen Bekassy, Albert Rémy and Nestor Paiva.

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse is directed by Vincente Minnelli, runs 153 minutes, is made by Blaustein, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Moctezuma Films and Olallo Rubio, is released by MGM, is written by Robert Ardrey and John Gay, based on the novel by Vicente Blasco Ibáñez, is shot in Metrocolor by Milton R Krasner, is produced by Julian Blaustein, is scored by André Previn, and is designed by George W Davis, Urie McCleary and Elliot Scott.

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 9301

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