The Sailor from Gibraltar *** (1967, Jeanne Moreau, Vanessa Redgrave, Ian Bannen) – Classic Movie Review 1644

Jeanne Moreau stars as nymphomaniac mysterious widow Anna, who wanders the waves in search of her dreamboat sailor she had known many years before. She comes across troubled British couple Alan and his girlfriend Sheila (Ian Bannen and Vanessa Redgrave ) on vacation in Italian waters, and then comes between them after quarrelling.

[Spoiler alert] Alan and Anna begin their search for  the sailor on board a yacht bound for Greece but they don’t find him. After a stop in Africa, Louis de Mozambique (Orson Welles) joins the party and suggests the sailor may only have existed in Anna’s mind.

Based on the Marguerite Duras novel, this 1967 puzzle film is well-intentioned, weird, arty stuff in the style of the time. Director Tony Richardson turns it into a smart, interesting film that’s always intriguing even if it is not entirely a success.

Moreau, Redgrave and Bannen all give excellent performances in tricky roles in difficult circumstances. Moreau’s good at wandering enigmatically, she did it early on in Lift to the Scaffold (1958). The Late Fifties and Sixties was a great time for existential angst! And the movie certainly looks very striking in Raoul Coutard’s cinematography. So the acting and visuals are great, but many audiences may wonder what the heck it’s all about.

Frustrating and elusive though it is, it’s worth seeing as an ambitious work of Richardson and co-writer Christopher Isherwood, and for a memorable cast that includes Richardson’s then wife Redgrave and Orson Welles in an extended cameo, as well as Hugh Griffith, Eleanor Bron, Zia Mohyeddin and Umberto Orsini.

Richardson is best known for Tom Jones (1963), A Taste of Honey (1961) and The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner (1962).

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© Derek Winnert 2014 Classic Movie Review 1644

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