Rating: 
Summary: a great romantic and dramatic film!
Review: This is a must see. Humphrey Bogart and Ava Gardner make a great romantic couple. This film is beautiful and dramatic, as well as romantic. It's in color, which is even more wonderful. Ava's costumes are gorgeous.
Rating: 
Summary: A well written witty melodrama from the 1950's.
Review: This is Ava Gardner's best role. She plays a dancer from the Spanish slums who is "discovered" by film director Bogart and taken to Hollywood where she becomes a star. The film is told in flashback and is narrated by three characters who play a part in her life: Bogart, Edmond O'Brien (an agent), and Rossano Brazzi (an Italian Count who becomes her husband). The film's title refers to the fact that she only feels at home with her feet in the dirt, despite her marriage into nobility. The dialogue is very witty and satirical. A lot of the fun comes from trying to match real names from "cafe society" with characters in this film. Today's movies seem very childish in comparison. They just don't make em' like this anymore.
Rating:
Summary: A MANKIEWICZ PRODUCTION
Review: When Joe Mankiewicz made this great film, he assembled his team, the Figaro Production company, which made only five movies. Others include I Want to Live and Suddenly Last Summer. The most interesting and flawed is The Quiet American, which has now been recounted in a new book called A THINKER'S DAMN: AUDIE MURPHY, VIETNAM, AND THE MAKING OF THE QUIET AMERICAN. If you want to see how Joe Mank worked and why his production company failed, you should take a look at this story.
Rating:
Summary: What will be, will be...
Review: Yes, this is a much more mature movie than most are used to these days and the story takes a bit longer to gain momentum. The characters actually have depth and they can act! How refreshing. While watching I found myself just intrigued with Ava Gardner and think she is perhaps one of the most beautiful women ever to grace the earth. The dialogue is simply deliciously revealing as the characters speak from their hearts. "There's more to talking than just words..." Ava plays the Barefoot Contessa, Maria Vargas who is discovered in Madrid. I expected there to be much more dancing in this movie, being it was about a dancer. However, there is just really one scene of her dancing out in the open with her gypsy friends where she sees the man she falls madly in love with. He is a nobleman and can provide everything for her. She sees him as the man who has seen more in her than any man ever has before. The scenes where Ava and Bogart converse are the most meaningful. Bogart has a way of bringing out Maria's natural curiosity. When anyone tells her "no" she says "yes." She is determined to be owned by no one and yet, everyone seems to want to own her. She fears being exposed and unprotected. Emotionally, she is still a child in many ways and believes in fairy tales. The harsh realities of loving someone and not receiving it in return seem foreign to her. The first scene is in a graveyard and from here, the scenes flash back to the past in a continuous fashion throughout with narration. Each part of the story is revealed at just the right moment. The rest of the movie seems to deal more with her career and love interests. The theme of Cinderella and "shoes" plays out well and is very significant in many ways. I thought that even though it wasn't really mentioned, when Maria says she didn't forget her shoes in one scene and Bogart picks them up for her, this symbolizes her complete trust in him. Watch for the significance of the shoes in one of the last scenes as well. The prince in this story loves Cinderella, there is just something he can never give her. While Maria says she needs someone to love her and make her feel safe, she wants the entire "Prince" package. What she finds is someone who doesn't love her enough at first, to tell her he can't make her completely happy. Che Sara, Sara
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