"Lord Jim" is a visually-impressive film with Peter O'Toole almost as charismatic (and troubled) as a leader of a native rebellion as he was in "Lawrence of Arabia". But apart from his conveying arms and gunpowder to the tribesmen one wonders if he was really needed, because they seem well prepared to attack their oppressors. His romance with Daliah Lavi reminds one of 1950s Westerns where the stranger rides into town and immediately strikes up a relationship with the local beauty who seems to have no other suitors. But the film is already long enough (at 154 minutes) not to embrace the other film cliché of there actually being a suitor who becomes jealous and betrays the newcomer to the other side.
After Jim is captured there's quite a build up to his torture which, when it happens, is anti-climatic in its brevity, certainly compared with O'Toole's ordeal at the hands of the Turks in "Lawrence". And the general's psychoanalytical assessment of Jim is unconvincingly remarkable in its accuracy, and the subsequent psychological pressure does not seem that arduous.
When the natives were celebrating their victory, I was wondering if I had misread the cast list as James Mason hadn't appeared. Then the film "starts up" again with a new plot line. It would have been better if Mason had been introduced earlier on, perhaps when Jim was trying to get a boat to transport the arms and gunpowder up-river or as an accomplice of the general.
That said, the film is good to watch. O'Toole performs well, and Mason makes a striking baddie. Their mid-river debate is compelling to watch.
After Jim is captured there's quite a build up to his torture which, when it happens, is anti-climatic in its brevity, certainly compared with O'Toole's ordeal at the hands of the Turks in "Lawrence". And the general's psychoanalytical assessment of Jim is unconvincingly remarkable in its accuracy, and the subsequent psychological pressure does not seem that arduous.
When the natives were celebrating their victory, I was wondering if I had misread the cast list as James Mason hadn't appeared. Then the film "starts up" again with a new plot line. It would have been better if Mason had been introduced earlier on, perhaps when Jim was trying to get a boat to transport the arms and gunpowder up-river or as an accomplice of the general.
That said, the film is good to watch. O'Toole performs well, and Mason makes a striking baddie. Their mid-river debate is compelling to watch.