Review of Gentleman's Agreement (1947) by Cecilie B — 30 Jul 2010

There are films that give off their "importance" all over the place, and this is one of those films. We can tell how conscience it is of its pertinence to the time period, and for that, this is not one of the great Best Pictures.

But, one can easily see why it won, and that is because it was dealing with radical issues within a provocative story. The performances from Peck, McGuire, Revere, Garfield, Holm, Stockwell, and Havoc are all terrific and Kazan's direction is stately and well-suited for the film.

It feels more like a choice for the time period than anything else, but there is something to the speech Revere's Mrs. Green speaks at the end, talking about everyone living together in peace. Martin Luther King, Jr.

felt the same way some 16 years later, and that still stands as a universal hope today.