Random Harvest
1942 Directed by Mervyn LeRoy
Synopsis
It's Great. Great Stars . . . A Great Story . . . A Great Author!
The film opens during the closing days of World War I. "John Smith" (Ronald Colman) is a British officer who was gassed and became shellshocked in the trenches. He is confined to an asylum because he has lost his memory and has trouble speaking. When the war ends, jubilation reigns in the nearby town of Melbridge and the gatekeepers abandon their posts to join the celebration. With no one to stop him, Smith simply wanders off.
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**Part of the Best Picture Project**
I feel bad for saying this, because it's an otherwise well made film, but Random Harvest is quite boring, mainly due to how dated the film is, and just how empty it manages to be.
Which is a shame because the story, while nonsense, is a good one. Ronald Coleman plays a WWI soldier with amnesia who doesn't remember his past and ends up falling in love with a woman played by Greer Garson. He then is in an accident that causes him to forget his current life but remember his old past war life.
Part of what makes the film good is the performances by the ever reliable Ronald Coleman and the charming…
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Yes, the plot of this movie is quite ridiculous. But Greer Garson and Ronald Colman are both very good and manage to elevate the material a bit so the film never becomes overly sappy. Colman is excellent particularly in the first part of the film where his character is somewhat shellshocked. Garson takes over in the second half, playing her part with an underlying sadness that makes you feel for her and want everything to work out in the end.
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This review reportedly contains spoilers. I can handle the truth.
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This is the best film I have ever seen in my entire life, and I am now 70. It is so pure a love story; so utterly beautiful. It's plot is both plausible and so perfectly acted that I still can't believe it. The extremely sensitive subtleties by Greer Carson and Ronald Colman, but especially Greer, are so deeply, deeply moving to me. As one example, and there are many, when, at the end of the movie, Greer says to Colman: "Oh Smithy,"----omg, the FEELING in her voice brings me to my knees every time. It is just so, soooooo beautiful. I am so grateful to experience this utterly beautiful love story. WOW.
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Every once in a while, a movie will surprise me. Having read the logline for Random Harvest, I expected camp melodrama that I would enjoy on a more ironic than sincere level.
What I got was a compelling, heartfelt drama with incredible performances from Greer Garson and Ronald Coleman, both of whom were so charming and compelling they distracted me from the somewhat preposterous plot.
A simple but well-executed story of love conquering all, this film deals with subtle nuance when it comes to emotion, something I am always happy to see if the oft overdramatic melodrama genre. The plot twists on a look or a sigh and, thankfully, director Mervyn Leroy had a cast who could pull this off.…
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Really enjoyable, sad and beautiful film. I dont really know Greer Garson, but feel I should now. The movies where 2 people are seperated and time is slipping away are the true horror films.
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**Part of the Best Picture Project**
I feel bad for saying this, because it's an otherwise well made film, but Random Harvest is quite boring, mainly due to how dated the film is, and just how empty it manages to be.
Which is a shame because the story, while nonsense, is a good one. Ronald Coleman plays a WWI soldier with amnesia who doesn't remember his past and ends up falling in love with a woman played by Greer Garson. He then is in an accident that causes him to forget his current life but remember his old past war life.
Part of what makes the film good is the performances by the ever reliable Ronald Coleman and the charming…
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This is a high melodrama about an amnesiac who forgets his wife, who searches tirelessly for him. It’s all very heightened and done in an old Hollywood style that’s not particularly realistic and which all feels very studio bound. If nothing else it shows how hard it was to find people before the advent of mass communications. This is the kind of thing that needs to be examined with a historians eye to see why this was an acclaimed Oscar nominee in its time. It’s all about big emotions and big acting and has a not-so-true to life happy ending. It’s a respectable work but not a classic in my eyes.
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I had a very Greer childhood
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Yes, the plot of this movie is quite ridiculous. But Greer Garson and Ronald Colman are both very good and manage to elevate the material a bit so the film never becomes overly sappy. Colman is excellent particularly in the first part of the film where his character is somewhat shellshocked. Garson takes over in the second half, playing her part with an underlying sadness that makes you feel for her and want everything to work out in the end.