Popular reviews

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  Review by Manoj Panicker ★★★

  This movie is the definition of 'Women live longer than men'.

  Set in the early 40s when mankind was obsessed with attaining the speed of sound, David Lean explores the efforts of a wartime aeroplane manufacturing giant to build the machine that break the sound barrier and finally understand the possibilities that lie beyond that speed. Through the eyes of the goal driven John Ridgefield, you see how mankind have always been obsessed with doing things not because they're necessary, but because they've never been done. The story focuses on how the relationship between him and his daughter, Susan, as their relationship stains further when he selects her newlywed husband, Tony, as the test pilot. By establishing John's solely goal…

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  Review by Darren Carver-Balsiger ★★½

  The Sound Barrier has a few fascinating moments but it's ultimately an incredibly dull film, concerned with the technical aspects of aviation to the point of tedium. I suppose flying was a lot more foreign and exciting when The Sound Barrier was first released, but even still it seems fixated on discussing aircraft rather than actually showing anything worthwhile. The dialogue is either jargon-heavy and bland, or emotional and philosophical in a flimsy, lazy manner. All this talk of how great air travel is makes it seem like the film has nothing else to say. In many ways, this is the peak of David Lean making a film with nice visuals but no purpose. The visuals are genuinely impressive though,…

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  Review by Graham Williamson ★★★★½

  Reviewed on The Geek Show.

  David Lean's least well-remembered film deserves renewed appreciation. Its upper lips are impeccably rigid and its accents are cut-glass enough to saw the Shard in half, but its unapologetically pro-science viewpoint and its heart-pounding pre-CGI stunt work feel as fresh and exciting as the day they were shot.

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  Review by Richard ★★★

  David Lean’s celebration of a time when, before the space race began in earnest, the sound barrier was seen as the next frontier, and of the enormous sacrifices that were made to explore it. Those expecting the epic majesty of Lean’s later work are in for a disappointment but, as with the impressive naval combat scenes he contributed to In Which We Serve, the superlative flying sequences demonstrate an imagination and inventiveness so notably absent from other films of the era.

  Unfortunately, the human drama never takes off. This is not because of Terence Rattigan’s literate screenplay so much as because the stiff-upper-lipped reserve and stoicism of the film’s characters feel emotionless and detached to the modern ear. As with…

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  Review by James ★★★½

  Much better than I was led to believe, The Sound Barrier is another of David Lean's least remembered films, despite being a box office success at the time. This loss of interest is understandable given that whilst the invention of jet engine propulsion was new and exciting sixty years ago, today it's taken for granted as an everyday luxury.

  The film carefully balances personal melodrama with an expansive, highly scientific (though not very factual) and technical fictionalisation of the race to break the sound barrier. The scope and soaring exaltation of Lean's visual spectacle outweighs an otherwise heavy-handed and plodding script by Terence Rattigan which stumbles over its own lacklustre human drama. As the cost of scientific progress begins to…

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  Review by PUNQ ★★★

  The story has its tragic edge, fine actors, and David Lean in charge, but it's not the most gripping story he'd ever put on film. Struggles to find the sympathetic note within the pioneering achievement of the tale of breaking The Sound Barrier (1952). Solid film, but not one any of them will be most remembered for.

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  Review by Xebeche ★★★½

  The first, second, and third acts of The Sound Barrier are practically identical, which makes the movie a bit tedious. However, David Lean makes each test flight sequence nail baiting through exceptional editing. He cuts back and forth from plummeting jet pilots to a team of radio operators standing motionless by the controls. Coupled with the hard audial transitions from staticky mid-air reports to the deafening engines above, The Sound Barrier delivers on the inherent suspense of high velocity air travel through Lean's technical prowess.

  The family melodrama built around this pivotal (and highly fictionalized) period is more interesting than I was expecting. Ann Todd is trying to comprehend the mental and emotional chemistry that could entice men like her…

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  Review by loureviews ★★★

  "Oh gosh ..."

  Terribly British stuff as Nigel Patrick romances Ann Todd, who lives in a huge mansion where they meet her RAF cadet brother (a very young Denholm Elliott). In Patrick's new privileged state he moves from being a test pilot to being handpicked by his millionaire father-in-law, and former flying ace, Ralph Richardson, to attempt to break the speed of sound.

  This action picture starts with banter between Patrick and co-pilot John Justin (you may remember him as the Prince in the 1940 'The Thief of Bagdad', but he was a real-life test pilot during the war), moves into mush, and then when we meet Richardson - with a ropey accent - the focus changes to the planning…

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  Review by Alfred E. Hitchman 4

  Ralph Richardson ruthlessly presides over a clandestine all-male pagan death cult that worships aerospace technology and orgasmically exults in fatal plane crashes, particularly those that claim immediate family members’ lives. When Richardson’s otherwise irrelevant, unforgivably female daughter brings home a RAF fighter ace she's just married, Richardson smells fresh blood in the stratosphere and sets about grooming his son-in-law to be the next toothsome sacrifice for the ravenous and implacable jet gods. Tragic complications ensue.

  Alongside Brief Encounter this is the absolute peak creative achievement of Lean's pre-epic years (ergo, Lean's peak achievement) and, if Brownlow’s to be believed, Lean's dark horse personal favo(u)rite among his own films, Shadow of a Doubt style. Deeply moving and satisfyingly fucked up in a way few of his subsequent films (really, just Zhivago, if I'm honest) would ever be. Woulda-shoulda but if Terence Rattigan had written Kwai and Lawrence I might’ve stood a better chance of liking them more.

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  Review by Jim Beaver ★★★★

  David Lean, leaving behind the epic approach for which he is particularly well known, directs in a more ironically down-to-earth manner this drama of aviation and determination, in a film that carries some of the trappings of the semi-documentary while keeping a firm grip on the human drama of people in extreme emotional circumstances. Despite the fact that much of both the history and the science depicted in this story of efforts to break the sound barrier are erroneous, the narrative contains quite authentic depictions of how the human heart copes with triumph and tragedy. Pictures about the nuts and bolts of aeronautic conquests and exploration were not uncommon in the period in which this film was made, but Lean,…

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  Review by jabbathehack ★★½

  it's always a pleasure to see ralph richardson but unfortunately the story didn’t manage to grab me. 
  it lacks the emotional heft david leans movies normally have. though beautifully photographed as usual. 

  unfortunately not the right stuff!

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  Review by Jesse Mitchell ★★★

  The Sound Barrier follows the attempts by the British aircraft industry to reach supersonic flight speed after WWII. This is one of David Lean's most obscure films, and while interesting it is by no means a hidden gem. There is some very nice footage of early jet airplanes in flight, as well as aerial photography of Paris and parts of Europe, which was probably pretty exciting in 1952. The film's story is adequate, with a few thrilling moments, but the film is not particularly memorable other than the flight footage.

  And while this film shows a British pilot as the first to break the sound barrier in 1948, an American, Chuck Yeager, was actually the first in 1947.