Home from the Hill

Home from the Hill Review

Home from the Hill Feature

• Southern drama involving a wealthy landowner's conflicts with his wife and two sons, one of which is illegitimate.Running Time: 150 min. Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating: NR Age: 012569795396 UPC: 012569795396 Manufacturer No: 79539

Home from the Hill is among the underrated titles in the careers of Robert Mitchum and Vincente Minnelli, two disparate talents who create a potent familial saga here. The setting is East Texas, where Mitchum's philandering patriarch rules the local area. His wife (Eleanor Parker) has raised their son (George Hamilton) as a momma's boy, the kind of soft kid who gets bamboozled into going on a "snipe hunt" with the pranking locals. His opposite number is a manly farmhand (George Peppard) with his own bond with Mitchum. Southern melodrama thrives in such a setting, and the film doesn't avoid all the traps, but Minnelli suffuses the movie with the same emotional effects of color and movement that he brought to his direction of musicals. Minnelli's sensitivity and Mitchum's strength carry the movie, but the secret weapon is the unexpectedly good work from the two Georges, both of whom were at the beginning of their careers. (You can see from this film that Peppard is a dead-cert to become a major movie star, which he almost did--but then didn't, for a variety of reasons.) The film was shot on location around Paris, Texas, and although this is far from Minnelli's An American in Paris, the exciting hunting sequences are solid proof that you can't pigeonhole a talented director. You can't pigeonhole Mitchum, either, and this is one of his best roles. --Robert Horton Un portrait de famille à l’intensité dramatique incomparable Dans l’un de ses plus beaux rôles, Robert Mitchum interprète le « Capitaine » Wade Hunnicutt, un influent chef de famille dont la passion commune pour la chasse et les femmes aura des conséquences dramatiques pour toute sa famille. Adaptation du roman best seller de William Humphrey, cette grande saga se focalise sur une riche famille d’une petite ville du Texas : le mari bourru et coureur de jupons (Mitchum) ; sa femme amère et distante (Eleanor Parker) ; le fils faible et introverti, Theron (George Hamilton) ; le viril fils illégitime de Hunnicutt, Rafe (George Peppard) ; et la femme magnifique (Luna Patten) dont les deux garçons sont amoureux. Quand la jeune et influençable Theron apprend l’inavouable vérité sur son père, les sentiments refoulés de la famille explosent, déclenchant un cercle vicieux qui conduira à l’apogée dramatique du film. Salué par la critique, Celui par Qui le Scandale Arrive bénéficie de la réalisation impeccable de Vincente Minnelli et des performances mémorables de jeunes acteurs comme George Hamilton et George Peppard qui font leurs premiers pas sur grand écran.