Reflections in a Golden Eye (1967) User Reviews (101)

A Murder Was Committed on an Army Post in the Deep South..........

[bkoganbing · 8/10 · 20 March 2006]

Reflections in a Golden Eye came out at an interesting transitional period for gay people. The Code that had dominated what could and could not be shown on the screen was just being lifted. That Code had succeeded in making gay people all but invisible by Hollywood standards. But it was two years before the Stonewall Rebellion which gave the gay rights movement a political voice.

Originally Montgomery Clift was scheduled to do this film with three time screen partner Elizabeth Taylor, but Clift died before the film started shooting. Marlon Brando took his place and in my opinion gave a very underrated performance as the repressed latent homosexual Major married to Elizabeth Taylor.

Brando and Taylor dusted off a couple of southern accents previously used in films, Brando from Sayonara and Taylor from Raintree County. But the characters here are vastly different from the characters portrayed in both of those other films.

Although certainly given Clift's background he was eminently qualified to play a repressed gay man, I'm not sure he would have been the type to have played an authority figure like Major Penderton here. Brando was far more the type. The part of the wife was Taylor made for Liz and she went to town with it.

I wonder what those people who want to keep gays out of the military would say about Brando. Brando's burgeoning homosexuality is finding an outlet in a raging crush on a handsome private played by Robert Forster. Forster during his off hours likes to walk and ride horses in the buff and sneaks into Brando's house to play with Liz Taylor's lingerie. Liz is having an affair with Brando's immediate superior Brian Keith who has an invalid and mentally disturbed wife in Julie Harris. And Harris spends most of her time with her very effeminate Filipino houseboy, Zorro David.

Of course this is a recipe for tragedy and tragedy does come. Author Carson McCullers, herself a lesbian, created some unforgettable characters here.

Reflections in a Golden Eye was way before its time. Today the film and Director John Huston would have gotten far better reviews than the film did in 1967.

An Odd Film, With Great Performances and Cineomatography

[elevenangrymen · 7/10 · 10 February 2013]

Major Penderton is a closeted homosexual living in a southern Army base. His wife, Leonora, is repressed and lashes out on him by having an affair with their neighbor, whose wife is mentally disturbed. One day, Penderton sees a young private, and he becomes infatuated with him. The same private becomes infatuated with Leonora, and begins to break into the Penderton house at night just to look at her. In the meantime, Lt. Colonel Langdon, the man whom Leonara is having an affair with, begins to grow worried with his wife.

Meanwhile, Major Penderton's infatuation with the soldier becomes more and more intense, bringing them all towards the brink of madness...

I have never found Huston's films to show subtlety in any way, shape or form. So, when I heard he directed a film about a closeted homosexual, warning signs began to flare up all around me. I was worried that Huston would treat the subject tactlessly, and that perhaps Huston would show Penderton as a "bad" person for his sexuality. I did not think, however, who would be playing Penderton. Marlon Brando.

My fears, however, were not verified. Huston not only treats the subject with tact, he allows Brando to give one of his most interesting performances. By giving Brando most of the weight of the role, he allows Brando to not portray the character as an innocent, or a bad guy. His character finds the moral gray area, and jumps straight in. Brando portrays a man who is disgusted by his very core, but one whom cannot resist his primal urge. Also, he totally nailed the southern accent, and even added his own mumble in the mix, to really make the character stand out.

Marlon Brando was one of the best actors of all time, and his portrayal is absolutely excellent. That is not to say, however, that he was the only one who gave a good performance. Elizabeth Taylor's floozy wife, is the exact opposite of Brando's introverted character. She is extroverted, unabashed and she speaks her mind. She seems like the perfect party girl, yet her moral core is even worse than Brando's. She doesn't care who she hurts, just as long as she gets what she wants.

Taylor worked a long time to get the film made, and you can tell she was made for the part. Also excellent is the always underrated Julie Harris. She seems to be a heartbeat from collapse in each scene, yet she strings herself along. Brian Keith is very good, but his part is the most underwritten. Although he says barely nothing, Robert Forster as the object of Brando's desire is a mystery. Why does he break into the Penderton house just to go through Leonora's things? Why does he always ride his horse naked, at the exact same time each day?

This mystery propels the current of foreboding that weaves itself through the storyline. I suppose this film could technically be called a mystery, the opening of the film features a quote from the novel it is based on. The quote states that there was a murder in the south. But who was murdered, and who was the murderer? The writing manages to propel this undercurrent in a way that is admirable. The pace is slow, but not languid, and the last few scenes rack up the tension, even though you have no reason to feel tension.

Reflections in a Golden Eye has been called a mixture of camp and mystery. While I cannot deny that the film does not contain camp, it actually works for the film. The film does not create a world that feels realistic. Rather, in the tradition of many Southern Gothic films, it creates a fantasy world that feels detached from reality. The cinematography does nothing but help this effect. From the opening shot, the film feels like a dream. Golden hues trickle down from the sky, and it is clear that at least some of Huston's tinting made it through to the final print.

While this dreamy effect is nice at the beginning, it slowly becomes more and more sinister. By the end, the golden hue has been replaced by jagged lightning. The effect works well. The score, is yet another weak link. It has moments where it is good, but in others it sounds over the top for such a film.

However, this does not mean the film is flawless. The price of originality is that it can become tiring at times, and this film is no exception. As well, the last shot is really cheesy, and it made me burst out laughing, when I probably shouldn't have. As well, the character Anacleto, Julie Harris's servant, is kind of annoying. Risking criticism, he seems to be the other end of the spectrum from Brando, meaning flamboyant as opposed to introverted.

Going back to the good points, Huston's direction is quite good. Instead of smashing the audience with a blunt instrument, his film does contain subtlety. By the end, it feels like a sick joke. That is in fact quite good. There is a deep, black satire embedded deep in the film, and it only makes the film more interesting. Huston's use of colour is also striking.

Overall this film, while flawed, is still one of Huston's most interesting films. Thanks to the great performances by Taylor and Brando, the film manages to not dumb down the issue of homosexuality, but also not to treat it in a negative light. Homosexuality is not what dooms Penderton, but in fact it is his inability to accept who he is that dooms him right from the start.

Reflections in a Golden Eye, 1967, Starring: Marlon Brando, Elizabeth Taylor and Julie Harris. Directed by John Huston. 7.5/10 (B+).

(This is part of an ongoing project to watch and review every John Huston movie. You can read this and other reviews at http://everyjohnhustonmovie.blogspot.ca/)

Most underrated John Huston's film

[IlyaMauter · 8/10 · 30 April 2003]

"Reflections in a Golden Eye" was recognized by John Huston himself as his most important film of his late period along with "The Man who would be a King". While generally the later is accepted as his masterpiece "Reflections in a Golden Eye" is misunderstood as Huston's "misfire", as a "flop", an opinion with which I tend to disagree. What we have here is a good drama whose story is based on a book by Carson McCullers, featuring superb performances from Marlon Brando who plays a U.S. Army Major in an isolated military fort somewhere in the south, who gradually discovers his homosexuallity and Liz Taylor, simply great here in the role of his cheating wife. The film, which is basically a serious drama, turns out to be something of a cynical human comedy, due to "ridiculousness" of all of it's characters and the way the story is told by film's director - John Huston. Overall it's an intelligent film whose main theme is repression and ultimate frustration of desire with it's tragic consequences. 8/10

Underrated Masterpiece from the '60s

[Mankin · 2 May 2000]

Marlon Brando's career was on a downward slide when he appeared in "Reflections in a Golden Eye" (***1/2). His previous film was Charles Chaplain's disastrous "A Countess from Hong Kong" in which he gave one of his worst performances. In "Eye" he proved that as an actor he was still capable of being as daring and surprising as he once was as a sexually repressed Army Major. Widely misunderstood at the time of its release, John Huston's adaptation of the Carson McCullers novel is a witty and provocative tragicomedy in which none of the characters succeeds in escaping from their own self-imposed prisons. There have probably never been two more incompatible married couples in the movies than the brooding introverted officer played by Brando and his bawdy, outgoing wife, a fine part for Elizabeth Taylor at her funniest and most natural. Complementing them are Brian Keith as a rather dim but basically good-natured fellow officer who is having an affair with Taylor, and Julie Harris as his hypersensitive invalid wife. Zorro David also scores as her pretentiously effete Filopino houseboy. One of the many fascinating things about this film is watching how these characters interrelate without ever making a real connection. Director Huston finds a great deal of humor (most of it intentional, I'm convinced) in this sometimes hard-to-take, but fascinating film.

Not without its faults but, on the whole, quite extraordinary

[moonspinner55 · 7/10 · 11 May 2001]

God knows what this picture looked like on the printed page--or, indeed, what this cast of talented actors were thinking when they first read it. Elizabeth Taylor probably thought it a hoot. I certainly did, but really...Julie Harris as a woebegone colonel's wife, living on a southern Army base in the 1950s with her sexually-estranged husband and a flamboyant houseboy, who has used pruning shears to--oh never mind. It's really about Marlon Brando as a sexually-repressed major, married to flirtatious belle Taylor but secretly lusting for stud-soldier Robert Forster (who rides his horse "barebacked and bare-assed"). Is it camp, serious, heartfelt or just terrible? Actually, it's all of the above, which is not only what kept me watching but keeps me returning. The moody film, based on Carson McCullers' Gothic novel, feels tampered with, muted in spots where it should be played to the hilt yet overdrawn when it should be subtle, yet this is part of its erratic appeal. Aldo Tonti's vivid cinematography (most especially in the full-color re-release print) is amazing, as is Toshiro Mayuzumi's hyperbolic score. John Huston directed, boldly and with flourish. It's a glorious mess. *** from ****

Admirable in many ways, beautifully staged and photographed and splendidly acted

[Nazi_Fighter_David · 7/10 · 11 January 2009]

The time is late 1948 and the setting is a U.S. Army post in Georgia, bordering on a forest preserve…

A Southern amoral wife called Leonora (Elizabeth Taylor) finds a way for her stream desire in an adulterous affair with Lt. Col. Langdon (Brian Keith), carried on almost openly…

Leonora gives aperture to her forcefulness and vigor in a passion for horses and riding… She is attached to a handsome white horse she calls Firebird and she provokes her husband by telling him that the animal is indeed a stallion with the emotional nature of man...

Leonora's husband (Marlon Brando) is a devious, insecure, impotent Army major, a hidden homosexual preoccupied with an unsociable, lonely rider who canters around the field in the nude and whose sexual emotional stress is diminished, secretively, at the bedside of the major's wife holding her clothes and looking fixedly at her marvelous hot body…

Private Williams (Robert Forster) is another lonely man fascinated by the fiery Leonora and her thoughtful and gentle comments to him… He takes to visiting the Penderton house at night looking attentively in the windows, observing with total recall and complete joy Leonora's nakedness, but also watching the Major in his study…

Keith's neurotic wife (Julie Harris) is well aware of her husband's affair with Leonora but she only feels well from her close friendship with her houseboy, Anacleto (Zorro David), an affected companion who shares her penchant for the arts and is in every way the opposite of her abrupt, strong husband…

Flavored with bitter insinuations and insulting sarcasms, Brando and Taylor's few scenes have enough flames to burn the silver screen… He's a tormented human being while she's delicious but shrill and insensitive… Aware of her physical beauty she fights back when she's rejected, instigating him with her impudent, insolent, shameless manner that offend his very being

Unusual, surreal, memorable work of art.

[petrelet · 9/10 · 22 March 2015]

This movie isn't for everybody. Huston, Taylor, Brando and the rest of the cast took some serious artistic risks back in 1967, and a lot of people didn't like the product; 50 years on, a lot of people still won't.

If one comes to it cold, hearing only that it is only a movie about "a closeted homosexual in the military", which is true of the Brando character, and expects some kind of serious dramatic narrative experience - like for example in "The Sergeant" which also came out in 1968 - the approach of "Reflections", which I think is not unlike that of a Beckett play, will be a surprise, and one might say, "this is a weird movie - it's not a good drama."

But I believe that would be a mistake. I don't mean that one kind of approach is "better" than the other, only that different kinds of movies with different kinds of artistic excellence as their goals shouldn't be measured by the same yardstick.

The action of this film is pretty much indifferent to place and setting; it doesn't need to be in the South and it doesn't need to be on a military base. It is sometime in the period from 1945-1960 when people of privilege spent their evenings at each other's houses, playing cards and drinking way more hard liquor than today. In fact the time and setting blurred in my view into a sort of dreamlike background, not demanding to be like a real place or time.

There are two military officers. There are their wives, whose thwarted lives are filled by avocations and disorders - sex, alcohol, and horsewomanship, or art, classical music, and depression. Their wives have admirers. One is the enlisted man played by Robert Forster, who elicits and then upsets one category after another. Another is the Filipino servant played by Zorro David (his only movie ever) with flamboyant swishiness, but is he really gay or are we being tempted to overassume? It's only what we see and judge, and neither can be trusted.

All have secrets, concealing who they really are while trying to figure out who the other people are, sometimes successfully, more often not. People read people and situations incorrectly and act upon their bad understanding and send the activity off in another direction. When people think they are unobserved they act much differently, comforting themselves in ways that are not provided for in the conventions that surround them. To borrow the thoughts of a character, they are all square pegs trying to deal with the round holes they have been hammered into by others or themselves.

And if that all reads sort of like the universal experience of people, that's sort of the point, I think.

I don't think it's perfect, but every time I try to pick a flaw I start to wonder if the artists didn't intend it just that way for a reason. Some detractors have noted that the Brando character's accent is just incomprehensible at times - I turned on closed captioning eventually. But then at one of those times he was giving instructions to a subordinate, who then doesn't carry them out properly, so was this on purpose? I didn't understand why the frenzied camera work in the final scene was done that way either. But was it meant to convey something? These people are not easily dismissed.

A flawed classic

[parachute-4 · 7/10 · 4 November 2006]

Way, way too much film for 1967 . Huston and the cast made a good job out of difficult material, but the mediocre box-office should not have surprised anyone; audiences brought up on films filtered by the production code simply weren't ready for the themes portrayed.

Liz Taylor does a master turn as a a southern virago penned up in a patently unsatisfactory marriage with Marlon Brando's insipid Major Wendel. One may well ask how they came to be married in the first place. She prefers men of a more red-blooded persuasion and is accommodated by one of Wendel's superior officers, whose own marriage is equally problematic. The greater part of the story revolves around the dynamics of these two marriages in the fishbowl world of the rural army post. With the nation at peace, the soldiers apparently have little to do and the devil obligingly provides them with some alternative activities to relieve their idleness.

I liked Brian Keith's portrayal of the laconic Lt Col Langdon, who cares for his wife deeply, but who doesn't agonize unduly over the moral dimensions of his affair with the voluptuous Leonora Presumably, the entire post is aware of this relationship with the sole exception of Major Wendel, who is treated with ill-disguised contempt by just about everyone. "Your wife is cheating" , Langdon casually informs Wendel in the context of a card game Langdon is playing with Mrs Wendel.

Marlon Brando clearly has some trouble with his role, and it is by far the most difficult part in the film. Huston's directorial style may have impeded Brando from properly coming to grips with the character, and in any case, sharing a stage with Liz was a tough number for even the best of them. However, the most important scene between the two, the "riding crop" incident, was excellently portrayed by both actors. This scene is correctly treated by Huston as being the essential climax of the whole story.

The role of the fragile, tragic Alison Langdon is superbly performed by Julie Harris. Alison is only too well aware of her husband's waywardness and despises Mrs Wendel to the point of insanity. Mrs Wendel for her part does not even see the problem and (apparently genuinely) pities Mrs Langdon and wants to be her friend. The appalling dynamic between the two women is well portrayed, as is the platonic relationship between Alison and her strange manservant.

Less well structured is the portrayal of Wendel's unrequited love interest with Private Williams, who himself is rather "alternative" sexually, but apparently not homosexual and therefore unable to appreciate or reciprocate Wendel's feelings. The film as a whole could possibly have benefited from a more explicit definition of Wendel's homosexuality , but the director could obviously only go so far in 1967. Alternatively, the opposite tack could have been pursued of letting the audience "do most of the work" in regard to Wendel's sexuality, but that would have required a lot more Brando on screen and somewhat less Liz; a devil of a choice for any director.

In fact, Huston deserves top marks for this film. It would have been a very tough call for any director and the combination of Liz Taylor and Brando was a most unusual casting combination. Liz is a fine actress, but was very much of the "old school", trained to expect and hence demand careful attention from the director at all times in all her scenes. Brando, on the other hand (and like Eli Wallach in this respect) was the "master of the method" and only really needed a director on hand to organize the camera angles and arrange the lights. Accommodating these diametrically different acting philosophies as well as the two gigantic egos on the one set would have made for a hard day's work, even for John Huston.

R. B.

Southern Fried Gothic Of The Most Delicious Kind

[gabrieletaibo · 10/10 · 7 August 2005]

Montgomery Clift was supposed to play Brando's part. Elizabeth Taylor had put her own salary as a collateral for insurances purposes. It wasn't to be but the thought stayed with me throughout the film without spoiling the perverse delights's of Carson McCuller's steamy original story. Gladys Hill, adapting McCuller's book, was clearly giving John Huston exactly what he needed, she did it two other times in "The Kremlin Letter" and most memorably in "The Man Who Would Be King" John Huston has traveled through many different universes throughout his career. Sometimes he merely visited with a fantastic inquisitive eye and his masterful hand. He was never one to judge, he seem to find redeeming sides even in the, apparently, unredeemable. Here he seems to observe this peculiar world from a distance and what he gives us is a brilliantly cinematic glimpse into the unmentionable. In lesser hands this would have been an heavy, turgid melodrama in Huston's hands is a brilliantly heavy, stunningly turgid, intelligent melodrama. Brando is terrific in one of his most uncomfortable performances. You sense he is a time bomb that stopped clicking. Elizabeth Taylor throws herself into the part with such gusto that keeps the proceedings not merely high but in flames - this was her messy wives period, Virginia Woolf and Zee - The shots of her beautifully round behind bouncing up and down her horse's saddle is a funny reminder of her National Velvet days. So far, far away. Here, her casual cruelty is so totally amoral that verges on innocence. Julie Harris's performance is nothing short of sensational and Zorro David as her loyal Anacleto starts as a caricature and ends as one of the stalwarts of the piece. The great John Huston had cinematographer Aldo Tonti to translate this kinky universe into a stunning, steamy masterpiece.

A sensual cat

[valadas · 7/10 · 14 March 2006]

In an army barracks where life seems to go on with apparent naturalness there takes place a human drama of lust, adultery and repressed homosexuality in which Elizabeth Taylor, that sensual cat, moves herself like a fish in a pond. She is married to a major (Marlon Brando) but has an established affair with a colonel (Brian Keith) since her husband seems not to accomplish with his marital duties, being a repressed homosexual feeling himself attracted against his will to a private soldier (Robert Forster). The colonel is married to a neurotic woman who has a filipino servant (Zorro David) who makes a curious character indeed in his devotion to his mistress. This story develops itself in a calm way interrupted here and there by only a few outbursts of emotion and violence when repressed feelings explode. It's not a masterpiece but a movie that portrays with enough truth and authenticity a lot of human actions and reactions, making it worth to be seen. I think however that Montgomery Clift who was first designed to perform the role of Major Penderton would have done it much better than Marlon Brando since he was a much more sensitive kind of actor in his performances.

From here to perversity

[Prismark10 · 5/10 · 31 August 2015]

Welcome to the world of Southern Gothic, a genre in its own right as director John Huston adapts Carson McCullers novel.

The breakdown of the Hays Code allowed this picture to be released in the mid 1960s with a daring depiction of sexual mores and sexuality in an army base along with some nudity and repressed emotions.

The film deals with a group of grotesques in a Southern army base after the second world war. Elizabeth Taylor plays the wife, Leonora of Major Penderton (Marlon Brando) who loves her horse, Firebird. She is having an affair with her neighbour Lt Colonel Langdon (Brian Keith.) There is a touch of the Cat on the Hot Tin Roof about Taylor's character, very much a spoilt rich girl on heat.

A more subtle but also visceral performance is given by Brando. He is left embarrassed by his wife's antics, in awe with army life and culture. Just look at the way he works out with weights, gives the lecture to a class and talks about the army at a dinner party. Yet Penderton is a repressed homosexual maybe why he is prepared to turn a blind eye to Leonora's infidelity.

Langdon's only solace is his time with Leonora, his own wife played by Julie Harris has had a traumatic breakdown resulting in self harm and he also has to deal with an effeminate Filipino houseboy who brings great comfort to his wife.

Robert Forster is the final piece in the jigsaw. His Private Williams cares for the horses in the army stables and has the habit of riding the horses naked in the fields. He becomes an object of Penderton's lust but Williams is also a creep himself. A voyeur who has a perverted desire for Leonora and sneaks into her bedroom and watches her.

Huston uses subtle use of light and visual tricks such as reflection in Private Williams golden eye to infuse the film with some artistic pretensions as well as various symbolisms.

It's a steamy, hothouse melodrama from the south, it imbues carnage and a tragic ending. Forster says few words in this film and his character has a dark edge, Brando despite a few heated argumentative scenes is more subtle here. He brings machismo and sympathy to a complicated character.

The film just feels too pretentious though, Taylor is kind of replaying A Cat in a Hot Tin Roof and would go on to play a more better known role a year later dealing with the breakdown of a twisted, bitter married couple in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf.

It is Brando that's makes the film watchable and he gives it a sort of quirkiness but I felt that this adaptation never gained full steam.

Brando Handles Sexual Tension, Lots of IT

[DKosty123 · 8/10 · 25 November 2015]

This is a film that sort of sneaks up on a period of time when this subject was still pretty taboo. The biggest thing is Brando harboring sexual tension for a young naked man on a horse. Competing with Elizabeth Taylor for his affections. The idea is good and a bit ahead of the 1967 audience.

This film has a lot more, including an excellent cast. This film might be one of Brian Keith's (Family Affair -TV) best most complete roles. It seems to me Keith never got a lot of great film roles and is often over looked during his career but this role is a challenge and he is more than up to it.

The ending makes sense as it completes the main plot, but there are a lot of good sub-plots in between. The subject matter at the time caused limited release of an excellent film. That is too bad for Keith since he is so good in it, but great for viewers who have rarely seen him in a strong role like he gets here.

Brando is fine though this is nowhere near his strongest screen role. Still he does fine without having a great role. This is an interesting one for film fans.

A new direction for everybody involved.

[bobsgrock · 7/10 · 9 April 2009]

Since mostly everyone involved in this film is either dead or retired, I think it is safe to say that looking back, Reflections in a Golden Eye can be seen as the turning point in many of the careers of those involved, particularly director John Huston and actor Marlon Brando. Huston, who before was used to working under strict studio rules and churned out some great Golden Age classics such as The Maltese Falcon, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre and The Asphalt Jungle, really goes out on a limb here in bringing Carson McCullers' bizarre tale of Southern drama to the screen. This is quite unlike anything he had done before and makes sense after seeing some of the films he made in the twilight of his directing career. As for Brando, once the biggest actor of the 1950s, his star had faded and many had forgotten him. Nevertheless, he took a role many thought wouldn't suit his style and nailed it, proving once again he is arguably the greatest actor of all time. Elizabeth Taylor was one of the biggest names in movies at the time, and she also shows her incredible versatility as the plucky and carping wife who is having an affair with her husband's colleague. There are also some nice supporting roles from Julie Harris as the sick wife of a loveless husband and a young Robert Forster as a mysterious private with a fetish for horses.

Again, this is a very bizarre tale and perhaps a second viewing is required to understand exactly what is trying to be said here. Nevertheless, the acting is top-notch from Brando and Taylor and Huston directs effortlessly and shoots in a weird, saturated light that adds to the strangeness of the atmosphere. Certainly a film for adventurous filmgoers, expect to scratch your head at the end of this.

Gold Finger on Trigger

[wes-connors · 4/10 · 19 November 2012]

"Reflections in a Golden Eye" begins with a quote from the original novel's author Carson McCullers, "There is a fort in the south where a few years ago a murder was committed." Elizabeth Taylor, Marlon Brando and Murder! It's a grand opening, full of promise. Unfortunately, the quote turns out to be the most exciting part of story. The film is in what you could call sepia/color; not entirely color, but not sepia, either. This is an obvious play on the "Golden" title. Got it...

Well-built young Robert Forster (as Williams) takes care of the horses, especially a white stallion named Firebird. He belongs to well-built wife Elizabeth Taylor (as Leonora). Her husband is mumbling major Marlon Brando (as Weldon). He is more interested in Mr. Forster than Ms. Taylor. Both display a nice pair of naked buttocks. A body double plays Taylor's part. She is having a not-so-secret affair with boring neighbor Brian Keith (as Morris). He is married to psychologically disturbed Julie Harris (as Alison). After a tragic pregnancy, Ms. Harris cut off her nipples with garden shears. She enjoys being fawned over by swishy Filipino houseboy Zorro David (as Anacleto). He reflects the title with a peacock's eye, and Forster brings it home by being both an exhibitionist and a Peeping Tom. Whew...

All of the above sounds better than it appears.

**** Reflections in a Golden Eye (10/11/67) John Huston ~ Marlon Brando, Elizabeth Taylor, Robert Forster, Julie Harris

Those Cleopatra Eyebrows

[Lechuguilla · 31 October 2007]

Apart from the barely discernible homosexual subtext, there really isn't much to this sudsy cinematic soap opera. The film provides a glimpse into the neurotic lives of two couples (Major Weldon Penderton and his pampered, beautiful wife Leonora; and Lt. Col. Morris Langdon and his spaced-out wife Alison). The four of them live at a military fort in the American South. A mysterious young soldier named Pvt. Williams (Robert Forster), who rides naked on horseback, and who stealthily creeps into Leonora's bedroom at night to contemplate who knows what, is the object of Major Penderton's implied fantasies.

What makes this film so maddening is the unspoken passion, the tacitly erotic obsessions that drive the entire narrative. It's all beneath the surface. The dialogue is largely irrelevant. It's what is not said that's important.

Even though this is a character study, we actually learn very little about the characters. Does Pvt. Williams even have a back-story? All of the characters seem to be in their own fog, their own delusional world, divorced from reality. Indeed, except for one sequence at an institution for the mentally ill, all the scenes take place at the military fort, isolated from the rest of the world.

The film's lighting is neither B&W nor color; it is a dingy, yellowish sepia tone with occasional splats of color. Background music is intermittent and nondescript. The pace of the plot is excruciatingly slow, with very long camera "takes".

The film's acting is acceptable. Elizabeth Taylor and her Cleopatra eyebrows give a nice performance, as does Brian Keith. Marlon Brando, as Major Penderton, nasally mumbles his lines, as if he had marbles in his mouth.

Best remembered perhaps as one of the 1960's films that brought about the MPAA ratings system, "Reflections In A Golden Eye" is stodgy and dull by today's standards. But in its day, this film was bold and daring in its depiction of a topic that was all hush-hush. For that reason, even though its entertainment value is questionable, the film is historically significant.

Strange film with many little subplots.

[yenlo · 7/10 · 9 July 1999]

A strange film starring Elizabeth Taylor and Marlon Brando. Everything in this film it seems is on the suggestive note. Homosexuality, SM etc. It requires the viewer to watch and watch with concentration to absorb the story. One bizarre feature is Zorro David as Anacleto a Philippine servant in the home of Julie Harris and her husband Brian Keith. He is cast as essentially a TA-TA boy who engages in weird conversations with Julie Harris's character. One hilarious part has him falling down a flight of stairs when he begins prancing around a room and forgets where the stairs are.

Elizabeth Taylor is probably at her most beautiful in this film. The movie is weird but if you've never seen it do so.

Self-consciously arty REFLECTIONS with only a mild payoff

[laszlo-11 · 6/10 · 26 May 2008]

Sometimes it pays to have low expectations. Rest assured, I was not expecting a lot from this movie, since the reviews I had read of it were often less-than-complimentary & that of a movie beneath the talents & pedigrees of all involved. I put this movie in & just let it go on. Final analysis: Yes, the high standards of cast, director & source outweigh the execution, but maybe those who have castigated the movie only watched it once, then threw it away. A second viewing might change their minds & maybe even mine.

Many people think REFLECTIONS was miscast, but I actually think the actors were matched to their parts just fine. We can only imagine how Montgomery Clift would have been as Penderton, but Marlon Brando gives somewhat of a rough approximation. In real life, perhaps we cannot imagine him being married to Elizabeth Taylor, but at least it is to Liz's credit that she insist Marlon be cast for Major Penderton. He was in the middle of a creative & box-office slump at the time, with many people thinking he was wasting his talents & making some movies just for the quick paycheck. I would venture to say this was probably his most substantial part in years, and if the movie's other components had been better-thought-out, people would have thought the same.

As for Liz, her pseudo-erotic role as Mrs. Penderton is mostly another day at the office for her. After winning a second Oscar for VIRGINIA WOOLF, Liz apparently still found good parts hard to come by & it seems this one was a role she could have done in her sleep (though her Southern accent is quite well-done). With the surprising amount of nudity for a film made in 1967, Liz indeed has one such scene, but as has been pointed out before, it was done by a double. The reason for this is probably because her drastically fluctuating figure made it unfeasible. The Production Code had been severely weakened by this time, but I am still surprised they let the movie pass with the nudity intact, even if it is mostly from rear & side views. I am sure if the movie had been released a year later with the new rating system, an R would not have been unreasonable.

The supporting cast is mostly left in the dust by the marquee value & histrionics of Brando & Taylor. Brian Keith again suffers from a "phoning in" syndrome with his Colonel Langdon, and makes you wonder if Julie Harris as his rather insane wife Alison is henpecking him to no end. That said, Harris does very well with her rather thankless role, especially with a major plot point involving her character (the "garden shears" incident) only talked about in passing, diluting its impact. If Liz had not have been the "STAR", Julie could have outdone her for "grande dame" theatrics.

Probably the character who suffers the most in a thin characterization is Private Williams. Robert Forster does what he can with a mostly wordless role & pretty much skulks about the movie, voyeuristically watching things unfold. Even when he is a part of the movie's main action (as in his nude horseback riding scenes, which are again done from a distance), he does not appear to affect it directly. When he meets his fate at the movie's end, you wind up knowing little about Private Williams than you did coming in. Warner Brothers was "introducing" Forster as a new find, but this was some role to do it with.

Director John Huston always considered REFLECTIONS to be a favorite film of his, but I would gather he thinks that way of the film that could have been made from it. Maybe he was too hamstrung by Carson McCullers' somewhat unfilmable text & the result was a little too haphazard in the narrative department. The ending in particular is one that has come under major criticism. It is one thing to leave more questions than answers for dramatic effect, but with REFLECTIONS, I imagine it was more a case of not having much more to do with the action, so they just abruptly ended it. The schizophrenic camera movement & Liz pulling off one of the longest, loudest screams this side of Fay Wray does not help matters at all. As a gifted, award-winning screenwriter himself, I would think maybe John Huston could have done a better job at the screenplay than those who did originally. But that is another thing we as the audience can only ponder in retrospect.

His original decision to mute out the colors for the film was grudgingly accepted by Warners, and was released to theaters that way initially. But when audiences complained about the cinematography, a normally-colored print was issued thereafter. The DVD release of REFLECTIONS restores Huston's "colorless" vision with a golden amber tone to the proceedings that, in effect, was a brave experiment, but I can clearly understand audiences' tepid response to it. Artyness is one thing, but when you lack a payoff for it, more harm is done than good.

Final thoughts: A failed experiment to be sure, REFLECTIONS IN A GOLDEN EYE still had plenty of good things going for it. But whether it was because of script or production problems, the final result is not much better than average.

Marlon and Liz get John Huston's muted-color southern treatment

[lee_eisenberg · 8/10 · 18 September 2019]

Marlon Brando's career may have been in a rut at the time, but he got a fine role in John Huston's "Reflections in a Golden Eye". I had never heard of Carson McCullers or her works when I started watching it, but I'm now eager to read her works. This tale of sexual tension and repressed homosexuality on a military base in the 1940s has it all (and I don't just mean a certain scene of Elizabeth Taylor). These are some of the most intense performances that you'll ever see, and the movie features what must've been some of the most extreme scenes allowed on screen at the time.

Definitely worth your time.

Southern Discomfort

[writers_reign · 6/10 · 27 June 2009]

Julie Harris had made her name in the stage version of Carson McCullers' The Member Of The Wedding and later played the same role, Frankie Jasmine Adams in the film version, so presumably that is why she was cast here. Carson McCullers inhabits the same Southern Gothic universe as Tennessee Williams and both Brando and Taylor were famed interpreters of Williams but fourth lead Brian Keith had, so far as I know, no connection with Southern Gothic. For McCullers, who arrived on the scene via a novel top-billing two deaf mutes, there was nothing out-of-the-ordinary in the ding-dongs thrown together here; a woman who cuts her nipples off with secateurs, a soldier who rides naked through the woods and sneaks into the home of an officer to sit on the floor of the bedroom where the officer's wife is sleeping, an impotent officer who collects that same soldier's discarded candy wrappers, a wife who horsewhips him at a party, jes plain folks. It's a long way from The Maltese Falcon and no, Mr. Huston, it don't beat the devil.

A Chilling Descent into Dark Sexuality and Madness

[irishcoffee630 · 10/10 · 8 April 2005]

This highly disturbing look at sexuality was way,way,way ahead of it's time in 1952 when Carson McCullers wrote the novel, let alone in 1967 when John Huston was bold enough to bring this to the screen. It concerns a group of people on a Southern army base in the 50's on the verge of sexual discovery and insanity. Marlon Brando plays a repressed homosexual married to the slatternly over sexed dimwit daughter(Elizabeth Taylor)of the army post General. She teases him with taunts over his "lack of interest in her" while she is having an affair with another officer Brian Keith. Brian is married to Julie Harris who has cut of her nipples with garden shears after a miscarriage (symbolically ending her female identification and interest in sex)and now lives in her bedroom, entertained by her effeminate Filipino houseboy as they watercolor, dream of escaping reality and listening to classical music. Meanwhile Brando becomes crazily obsessed with a handsome enlisted (and psychotic) man (Robert Foster) who rides naked on a horse in the woods and eventually begins to tease Brando with sexual nuances. But Foster also is sneaking into Taylor's room at night and doing something (I can not say it here, but it is solo and involves her panties) by her bed while she is in her usual drunken/pills induced stupors. Eventually all this Fruedian psychosis ends in the final explosive scene, a murder. I liked this film because it delves into dark subjects we rarely see on film, the actors are amazing (especially Brando), the photography is top notch and the extremely well written script drips in Southern Gothic guilt, symbolism and remorse (but no redemption). Two scenes that sent chills up my spine was Brando standing in the pouring rain caressing the secretly picked up candy wrapper Foster dropped, as he stares aggressively at Foster entering the barracks to take a shower and the final scene as the camera madly jumps around the room accompanied by one character's horrified screams and another literally gone insane. One of the most fascinating psychological films I have ever seen. NOTE: This film along with another Taylor vehicle "Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolf?" I've been told by a film scholar,were the catalysts for the rating system that emerged in 1968.

Lots of star power, but a little melodramatic

[gbill-74877 · 7/10 · 21 July 2020]

Marlon Brando, Elizabeth Taylor, and John Huston collaborating to adapt Carson McCullers' 2nd novel, one that pushed sexual boundaries, is something that I looked forward to seeing. McCullers work of dark, fractured lives in the South is in the company of William Faulkner and Tennessee Williams, every bit as good, and predated Williams - her first two books were written a few years before he broke through with 'The Glass Menagerie.' Like a lot of women artists, she's underrated.

Illicit sex and sexual repression are pervasive in the story: an army major (Brando) is a closet homosexual married to a brazenly lusty woman (Taylor); right under his nose she's having an affair with his friend, a colonel (Brian Keith), who is in turn married to a woman traumatized by her child dying (Julie Harris); comforting her is a (stereotypically) effeminate servant (Zorro David); meanwhile, an enlisted man (Robert Forster) is a peeping tom who likes to go out riding buck naked, driving Brando's character to distraction. Whew, that's a lot, and maybe too much. The melodrama that works in print is less successful on the screen, even though the film is faithful to it, and both are pretty reserved, leaving a lot to our imaginations.

As in some of his other films, I'm not quite sure about the accent Brando affects, but in his scenes of emotional intensity and in those where his character quietly tries to reconcile the fact that he's a "square peg in a round hole", he's brilliant, and as always, fascinating. Taylor is pretty strong too, especially when she dominates him, which she does both physically and mentally, at one point parading around the house defiantly nude. I'm not sure about the supporting cast though, as they seemed a little flat, and I didn't like some of the choices Huston made. The color palette is tinged yellow and subdued to just barely above black and white throughout the film, the soundtrack is dated, the pacing is off, and the ending camera movement not very artistic, to put it kindly. I loved the emotional angst but to be honest, I struggled to stay fully interested. Worth seeing though.

Apart from shock value, there isn't much to this one...

[planktonrules · 3/10 · 9 June 2012]

I saw the DVD version of this film and its print is the original golden-toned version (where the only other color that is noticeable are the reds). Apparently, audiences were NOT impressed by this weird amber look and the film was removed from circulation and released in a normal print. I would have preferred this second print, as the look of the original is hard on the eyes.

This story must have really caught folks' attention back in 1967. Not only did it star two of the hottest stars of the day (Liz Taylor and Marlon Brando), but its plot was very, very adult--with themes of adultery, sadism, homosexuality, perversions I cannot classify (what's with the horse and that naked guy?!)and voyeurism! In addition, there is some nudity (I think they used a body double for Taylor in her scenes--as you can't see her face)--something very unusual for the time. Heck, even today this would make quite a stir in the theaters! This is one you have to see for yourself to believe!

The film begins with Brando playing an officer in the Army. His wife has contempt for him, as he's impotent--and deeply closeted. So, she has an affair with their neighbor (Brian Keith)--a fellow officer. As for Keith, his wife (Julie Harris) is severely depressed following the death of their child and all her moments with their houseboy. As for this houseboy, he is a VERY effeminate homosexual who minces about the house to the wife's amusement (clearly the woman could have used a TV or some books). Clearly, this was not filmed in Mayberry! And, more importantly, is the film any good or is director John Huston just warming up for his next and even more super-offensive film, "Myra Breckenridge"? Unfortunately, once you peel away all the shock value of this film, you are simply left with nothing...no plot of any great interest and a waste of some talented actors. I have no idea WHAT this film was trying to say other than we are all hypocrites--though this is hard to generalize from the film since NO ONE in the film acts like anyone remotely normal or realistic. A weird misfire...but a misfire nevertheless.

Huston and Brando at something near their best

[dave13-1 · 9/10 · 6 January 2012]

Director John Huston paints life at a Georgia army base in odd pinkish and amber tones to point up its off-color nature beneath its khaki uniformity. Reflections features Brando as a Colonel, supposedly courageous and a leader of men, who turns out to be weak, cowardly, hag- ridden, and unsure of his sexual orientation. It was one of his best, most creative and least likely performances, and shocking to audiences of the time. If anybody but Brando had played that character it would have scarred his career and maybe ended it. Just taking on the role was a brave move, but he did so much with it to bring out the man's un- Brando nature. Bold, brilliant and daring as a lead performance, he plays off wonderfully against Taylor in one of her patented bitch queen roles as an unsatisfied man-eater stifled by the regimentation of living as an army wife. The scene in which she flogs him for a weakling in front of dinner guests is shocking to watch but wonderfully evocative of the nature of their relationship roles. Taylor's infidelity and Brando's weakness become two sides of the same co-dependent coin.

Reflections was a watershed film in its day but at the same time years ahead of its day. It flopped at the box-office because the mid-60s were just not ready for it.

Kind of Interesting

[daoldiges · 7/10 · 14 June 2018]

Huston, Brando, Taylor, repressed homosexuality . . . I was definitely curious. This isn't a bad film but at the same time its not a great one either. I did however find it interesting. The story was thin but kept me engaged and I enjoyed seeing Brando and Taylor together at the later stages of their careers. Definitely worth checking out for true film lovers.

John Huston's depressing, oddly compelling adaption of Carson McCullers' best-selling social elegy is, still and all, a misfire.

[gbrumburgh-1 · 3/10 · 18 October 2001]

Carson McCullers' second novel `Reflections in a Golden Eye,' first published in 1941, is a great depressing read -- full of lurid, loveless, neurotic, alienated, self-destructive characters who mire in their own and others' unhappiness. The mood and tone distinctly reflect the author's own morbid life story (McCullers, the Diane Arbus of literature, was a chronic depressive and bisexual who was married to a suicidal alcoholic and bisexual). In 1967, John Huston took her novel to film. End result: the book is infinitely better than Huston's erratic, muddled handling of the rather ignoble material. I'm sure it was very tempting to tinker around with this type of scandalous fodder, especially with the abolishment of the longstanding Hollywood production code in the mid-60s, but what comes off morbidly fascinating in the novel with its themes of self-mutilation, masochism, impotence, sex and murder, is just plain dreary here. Pseudo-smut can come off quite boring, sometimes laughable, if not handled properly.

Set on an army base in the Deep South, the story revolves around Captain Penderton (Marlon Brando), a morose high-commanding officer and pent-up homosexual who disguises his humiliation with sadomasochistic acts. He finds an interesting outlet for his deep-seated frustrations by fixating on a very handsome young private on base, who has his own arousing aura of mystery. As the Captain scouts around, he finds out that the private, a raging sociopath if ever there was one, gets his kicks taking naked midnight rides in the woods on his horse and engaging in voyeurism. The Captain naturally is curious yellow and yearns to find who the target of this man's obsession is. Meanwhile, the Captain's shrewish, adulterous wife, Leonora (Elizabeth Taylor), a spoiled slob of a socialite who, after the death of her son, decides to make life a living hell for her husband, sexual distraction with Major Langdon (Brian Keith), her neighbor, while his crackpot invalid wife, Alison (Julie Harris), a walking suicide just waiting to happen, seems to find her only source of joy in the company of her devoted, extremely prissy houseboy who gets off on spouting poetry passages and flouncing around the room like `Tinkerbell.' God, love it-- is this America or what?

The first and foremost problem with Huston's film is that its interest is derived not from the sordid characters but from the high-profile stars who play them. Taylor delivers another in a long list of blowsy, viper-tongued bitches that she started churning out after her Oscar-winning performance as monster Martha in `Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?' in 1965. As in other grotesque roles of this ilk and era (`Boom!', `Hammersmith Is Out,' you name it' ), she is all bark and all bite...shrill and shallow. It is a one-note performance that comes off lazy, annoying, and ultimately tedious, with no shred of dimension or nuance to perk up the distastefully sensational aspects. Like Bette Davis' Rosa Moline in `Beyond the Forest,' Taylor squelches our desire to care about or understand this vindictive, bitter woman's misery. Just feed her to the wolves and be done with it. Is it any wonder Brando's character is turned on to her polar opposite -- a man with nothing to say?

Marlon's tortured Captain is the film's big lure here. He brings to the movie all the mumbling melancholy he can muster and he alone commands any sympathy. But you can't help forgetting the character while concentrating on Marlon's technique as he teases us with ever-so-slightly mincing affectations. How is Marlon going to play a closet queen in uniform? That is the excitement and the oddly compelling element of this feature. Is he successful? Not really. But you can't help but be drawn to him. He is Marlon after all. Initially cast in this role was Taylor's close, devoted friend (and closet homosexual) Montgomery Clift, who died before filming began. I doubt if he could have done any better than Marlon, despite Monty's correlation.

Dark, handsome, saturnine Robert Forster is indeed another drawing point in the role of the remote, taciturn private. This was his first big role and though he has almost no dialogue, Huston manages to make him a fascinating, rather enigmatic and sexy figure. Gruff and virile Brian Keith is reliable as always, while plaintive Julie Harris is a pro when it comes to dishing out the neurotics. Zorro David's portrayal as Anacleto, the houseboy, is bad and sad enough to send the gay movement back thirty years. It's reviling, degrading and, like a horrible traffic accident, impossible to ignore. No wonder Brando's character is desperate to keep his little secret. Look at his role model! This was David's first and only film role. You see? There is justice.

The overall production values may be up to snuff but the camera work is lifeless and mundane -- and they certainly do not flatter the actors, that's for sure - particularly Taylor, who was getting quite zaftig at this time. To top it all off, the supposedly explosive climax is shot terribly, with Huston's jarring, swerving camera moves from character to character coming off amateurish. A totally bizarre miscalculation on his part to achieve the shocking effect he was going for.

You WILL stay with `Reflections in a Golden Eye' but be warned: it will leave you as empty as the film's characters, and you'll probably hate yourself in the end for caving in to your primitive, prurient curiosity. McCullers' first novel, `The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter,' as a book and film, is better in practically every respect. Catch IT instead.