AFI Movies: #52 From Here to Eternity

A movie that will live in infamy (in my mind).

Aug 08, 2024

If you missed my first post where I explain what this is and how I’m scoring things, here you go.

If you’ve been tracking my journey through the AFI 100 Years…100 Movies list, you may have noticed that the first one hundred years of American cinema have not been particularly flattering to the United States Military. In fact, if you were making the decision whether or not to enlist, and were using the movies on this list to help you make your decision, you’d have a whole list of reasons why not to join just from the films I’ve written about so far. While the extensive list of physical and psychological horrors that has been presented so far may be enough for you, this next movie, From Here to Eternity, gives another reason to stay away from the military: inability to have a normal relationship.

From Here to Eternity is a 1953 film about soldiers stationed in Hawaii near the end of 1941. At the center of the story are three soldiers, and two women: Private Prewitt (played by Montgomery Clift), Sergeant Warden (played by Burt Lancaster), Private Maggio (played by Frank Sinatra), Karen Holmes (played by Deborah Kerr), and Alma Burke (played by Donna Reed). Prewitt is transferred to the base, and immediately harassed by Captain Holmes, his commanding officer, to join the boxing team on the base. This causes Prewitt a lot of problems, as Holmes then tells the other boxers to make Prewitt’s life miserable. Prewitt’s only friend on base is Maggio, who encourages him to join him on a night out where Prewitt meets Alma, who is going by the name Lorene while working at this weird social club that I’m half convinced is supposed to be a brothel but because it was 1953 they had to tiptoe around that fact. Meanwhile, Sergeant Warden notices that Captain Holmes is not being a good husband, and is often sneaking around with other women, which makes Warden upset because Mrs. Holmes is attractive. From there, we get a series of events where nobody ends up being happy.

Was I happy at the end of the movie? Find out as we go to the categories:

Entertainment Value- 0/2

I really debated this one. I did. For a solid minute I sat here and was like, “Am I really going to give this a zero when I gave Amadeus a point?” You know what? Yes. I am.

You’re probably reading through this waiting for me to mention the attack on Pearl Harbor, since I mentioned that this takes place in Hawaii in late 1941. The whole time I was watching this movie, that’s what I was expecting. The attack would be the main conflict. Not really. It happens, but we see like 30 seconds of it, and the only plot point that comes from it is that Prewitt decides to run back to base after being AWOL for several days after killing another soldier off screen. He gets shot, Warden identifies him, and then we see the two women on a boat going back to the mainland, and the movie ends. Trust me, I made all of that sound way more exciting than it actually was.

Correctness- 1/2

I probably1 don’t spend enough time talking about how poorly written female characters have been throughout the history of Hollywood, but Karen Holmes is up there as one of the least developed characters to be featured on the poster of the movie that I’ve seen so far. Not that any of the male characters are particularly interesting, either. In fact, that’s the biggest problem with this movie, it’s character driven, but the characters are all so uninteresting.

Also, as you may have guessed, they could have taken “black” out of “black and white movie” and it would have been just as accurate.

Influence- 1/2

I’m giving this a point because there is an old Hollywood legend that Frank Sinatra got his part in this movie because of his affiliation with the mafia, which inspired the scene in The Godfather with the horse’s head. The story has been refuted by multiple sources, but The Godfather scene still exists.

Oh, also Sgt. Warden and Mrs. Holmes make out on the beach for a few seconds, and apparently that was a big deal, too.

“Rewatchability”- 0/2

“From Here to Eternity” can also describe the amount of time that will pass before I watch this movie again.

Technical Score- 2/2

A while back I decided to weigh the Oscars results into this category, probably to hedge on how big of an idiot I am when it comes to judging films, but I’m actually kind of regretting that with this one. This movie won 8 Academy Awards, and was nominated for 5 others, including Deborah Kerr for her portrayal of the character I just bashed on a few paragraphs ago2.

Maybe I am an idiot.

Overall- 4/10

I just spent the last several minutes going through all the movies I’ve scored so far to make sure I wasn’t being too hard on this one, and you know what? I’m not. I didn’t like it, and I’m sticking to it.

Words With Peck

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