"THE STRANGER," with Marcello Mastroianni,is a faithful pictorial representation of the Albert Camus noveland that's what causes the trouble.
The events of the story are depicted with scrupulous adherence to the facts. But Camus told a story that hinged on "interior" matters, not so much what happened, but what it meant to the laconic young Frenchman in Algiers who killed an Arab and was sentenced to be executed for his crime.
Mr. Mastroianni is a perfect representation of what one might imagine the hero to be handsome and not so much withdrawn from society as disengaged from it. Anna Karina plays Maria, the beautiful girl with whom he has an affair, in an earthy style that adheres to the manuscript with equal fidelity.
As produced by Dino De Laurentiis and directed by Luchino Visconti, the scenes are striking illustrations for the novel. The segments showing the young man attending his mother's funeral at an old-age home are especially well done. The soundtrack, in French, with typographical-error-laden English sub-titles, stays close to the words of Camus, with the star even reading some of the passages behind the film image because they cannot be acted.
But right there lies the big "but." The point of the story, or at least one of its points, is that man's fortune is decided by chance. This hangs over every line, the thought that one can do little to change things.
Even the senseless shooting of the Arab took place at an accidental, surrealistic moment, prompted by the oppressively hot sun. The death sentence results from the piecing together of incidental mishaps. There is here an undercurrent of Eastern fatalisminsh' Allah, God's willand French ie m'en fou-tisme, the hell with it all.
Camus has expressed this brilliantly in literary form. But translated into film here, the thoughts lose their dramatic impact, because they deal with intangibles that are not portrayable in traditional cinema terms. Because of this, "The Stranger" becomes stodgy and colorless, even in color.
Because "The Stranger" deserves so much more, it is all the more disheartening to see an effort so painstakingly loyal wash out as a mere story line.
The events of the story are depicted with scrupulous adherence to the facts. But Camus told a story that hinged on "interior" matters, not so much what happened, but what it meant to the laconic young Frenchman in Algiers who killed an Arab and was sentenced to be executed for his crime.
Mr. Mastroianni is a perfect representation of what one might imagine the hero to be handsome and not so much withdrawn from society as disengaged from it. Anna Karina plays Maria, the beautiful girl with whom he has an affair, in an earthy style that adheres to the manuscript with equal fidelity.
As produced by Dino De Laurentiis and directed by Luchino Visconti, the scenes are striking illustrations for the novel. The segments showing the young man attending his mother's funeral at an old-age home are especially well done. The soundtrack, in French, with typographical-error-laden English sub-titles, stays close to the words of Camus, with the star even reading some of the passages behind the film image because they cannot be acted.
But right there lies the big "but." The point of the story, or at least one of its points, is that man's fortune is decided by chance. This hangs over every line, the thought that one can do little to change things.
Even the senseless shooting of the Arab took place at an accidental, surrealistic moment, prompted by the oppressively hot sun. The death sentence results from the piecing together of incidental mishaps. There is here an undercurrent of Eastern fatalisminsh' Allah, God's willand French ie m'en fou-tisme, the hell with it all.
Camus has expressed this brilliantly in literary form. But translated into film here, the thoughts lose their dramatic impact, because they deal with intangibles that are not portrayable in traditional cinema terms. Because of this, "The Stranger" becomes stodgy and colorless, even in color.
Because "The Stranger" deserves so much more, it is all the more disheartening to see an effort so painstakingly loyal wash out as a mere story line.
