Product Details

• Actors: Deborah Kerr, David Farrar, Flora Robson, Esmond Knight, Sabu
• Directors: Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger
• Subtitles: English, Korean
• Region: All Regions
• Run Time: 100 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
• ASIN: B001GLNMFM
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #64,748 in Movies & TV (See Bestsellers in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
Plagued by uncertainties and worldly desires, five Protestant missionary nuns, led by Deborah Kerr's Sister Clodagh, struggle to establish a school in the desolate Himalayas. All the elements of cinematic arts are perfectly fused in Powell and Pressburger's fascinating study of the age-old conflict between the spirit and the flesh, set against the grandeur of the snowcapped peaks of Kanchenjunga. *** IMPORTED FROM SOUTH KOREA *** ENGLISH LANGUAGE WITH ENGLISH & KOREAN SUBTITLES *** NTSC ALL REGIONS *** FULL SCREEN ***

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars a must to have in your collection, December 7, 2008

By	Frank Elliott "Captain Fitzroy" (Hendersonville, NC United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Sometimes the glowing reviews on Amazon can lure one into buying an old movie such as this one. I assure you will not be disappointed. The other reviewer here gave a fine description of the story; so it is hard to add to that. I do have to remark on what a literary accomplishment it really is . Superb acting and filming only expand this lofty tale to infinite horizons. I am astounded that something produced before 1950 could stand against any famous cinema we have all heard of over and over again-vis, Casa Blanca, or Citizen Kane. This is right up there with them. In those movies, like Casa Blanca, there was the sharp contrast between black and white; and the story itself with sharp contrasts in character development. This one has it also. Each performer exudes what they were designed to exude in the original novel-which I would now like to find and read. The crisp, impeccable youthful nun with her first " in charge".
The "awful" Mr. Dean...the very charicature of swashbuckling, tall dark and handsome, calm, cool, over confident, wise, and morally diffuse aide to the Hindu General benefactor who supplied the palace for the nuns - a former palace in which the harem was confined/safeguarded and opulently cloistered-replete with some borderline ancient erotic mural work on the now decaying walls...a little difficult for the young mother superior to endure/countenance.
Speaking of subliminal lust...few will ever forget the performance by the slipping into stark raving mad with bristling lust Sister Ruth!
A number of things suddenly revive Sister Ruth's memory of unrequited love...so in love, so eager and ready to get married to her boyfriend...who suddely left for America from boring, small town Ireland. And being a small town, the whispering among the gossipmongers so prevalent in such boring small towns...was too much so she joined "the order'. But now, it seems in this place, every thing brings back memories of her youthful full flowering into exuberant womanhood, complete with ultra strong sexual stirrings. This all comes flooding back to her. She begins to have no small fascination and attraction to the 'awful Mr. Dean', who himself exudes inviting manliness and excess testosterone, redolent from every pore. Mr Dean does for Sister Ruth what spinach does for Popeye.

Other reviewers have marvelled at how the actress portrays a growing 'madness'..and oh she does, beautifully. Today she would get an Oscar for this performance. Yet I must add a more sinister facet to this performance, one which the actress seems to understand intuitively, if not intellectually and theologically - that this is more than 'madness'...it is precisely the way demonic spirits operate..their identifying "M.O.", if you will. I am acutely aware that few take this seriously today; but this is a gargantuan error- to laugh off such "nonsense". The inexplicable brutalities we hear reported on the nightly news should give us a clue, an inkling, a hint that this is no laughing matter.
Although Mr. Dean is cast as the 'male pulchritude" titillating the sexually underpriveledged women of the monastary...and seemingly morally adrift in hedonism...he is in fact sensitive to matters of demonic dangers. It is indeed Mr Dean who offers the sagest advice for Deborah Kerr- the young Mother Superior - who dislikes him intensely
( because of what he stirs in her?? It isn't him she dislikes...it is the overwhelming desire to return to the world and be a woman again...a sensual wife to one such as he...mm,mmm,mmm!)
Mr Dean is the only one who seems to recognize the true danger that Sister Ruth represents..he declines her offer for sex after she slips down to his abode in the tropics at night in her, heretofore secretly ordered red slinky dress and red lipstick ( another contrast...lush and warm in the valley...cold and barren up on the mountain top ). As it turns out, he is , again, the only wise man on the set - even though there is a 'wise man' who sits in meditation all day and night near the monastary, never speaking-it is Mr. dean who knows all , sees all, and actually happens to be useful-more so by far than the silent holy man.

And then there is kanchi...the young, high wattage, breathtakingly tempting peasant girl, with no prospects for marriage, and needing a man...real bad! ... brought into the nunnery for some 'good influence' to keep her pure, hopefully...ahem... ( not a chance!).... so you see The exotica of the Indian people and their customs and glorious costumery are all just too much for those trying to escape the world and not be continually entertaining erotic thoughts, like the continual ringing of a phone.
You see what I mean by 'contrasts".
There are many operas that were composed based upon popular novels of the 19th century. I see this as one that could easily render itself magnificently as an opera....this would be better rendered in the Spanish Zarzuela style, or Hollywood musical style...with spoken dialogue, interspersed with sumptuous, and memorable melody and tempo. The creative latitude would be as wide and as high as the deep valley below the palace, and as high as the Himalayas in the distance. Can you imagine the sensuous drum beat one hears in exotic places such as this? In this production, the drums in this film are pretty lame, and so are the Tibetan horns...but you get the picture. Anyone who has ever heard the drums of India and the Mideast know how sensual they can be. There is much more glorious music to explore that emanates from such ancient and atavistic societies like this one. One gets the feeling that in Biblical times, everyone dressed in opulent and glorious raiment such as you will see in this film. For instance, there were a certain tribe of "Moabite Women" who came in large numbers into the camp of the sojourning Hebrews during their 40 years in the wilderness that tempted the men. It was just too much after all thsoe years of privation...these lucious, gorgeous, and so sensually adorned gals...it was too much for the poor hebrew men..they ran to be with them, and wasted no time getting it on....one can only imagine that they all must surely have looked very much like Kanchi ! Today,we dress like street urchin dishwashers on our way home from working a 12 hour shift at the cafeteria, on the public transit system... by comparison. None of us have the foggiest clue what the word 'raiment' means....or what the word 'music' means anymore...our dismal lives are just driven by the relentless drumbeat and chant of hip hop-like the monotonous clickety clack one might hear riding as a hobo in a freight car. . As the economy continues to stumble and collapse...we would all do well to reflect on our cultural poverty. But before you lose everything...buy this DVD. I'm sure they will let you watch it on the homeless shelter TV and DVD player; muttering to yourself..."I coulda been a contender".