Synopsis
Santiago is an aging, down-on-his-luck, Cuban fisherman who, after catching nothing for nearly 3 months, hooks a huge Marlin and struggles to land it far out in the Gulf Stream.
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Cast
- Spencer TracyThe Old Man
- Felipe PazosManolin, the Boy
- Harry BellaverMartin, the Cafe Bartender
- Don DiamondCafe Proprietor (uncredited)
- Mary HemingwayTourist (uncredited)
- Joey RayGambler (uncredited)
- Mauritz HugoGambler (uncredited)
- Tony RosaGambler (uncredited)
- Don BlackmanArm Wrestler
Recommendations
- 75
TV Guide Magazine
Sturges's direction, given the confining nature of the settings, is masterful, and the cinematography headed by Howe and pieced together by many others is sometimes stunning. - 63
USA Today
Some of James Wong Howe's photography is lovely, compensating for the rear-projected fish. [12 Jul 1996] - 60
Chicago Reader
While Spencer Tracy provides a solid performance in the title role and Dimitri Tiomkin won an Oscar for his score, the overall effect of trying to film this rather unfilmable novel is a bit like an illustrated slide lecture. - 50
Entertainment Weekly
Essentially, it’s a slow-moving, low-rent Moby Dick with portentous voice-overs and unconvincing process shots of Spencer Tracy in a studio tank. In fact, why director John Sturges (The Magnificent Seven) bothered to make it remains a mystery. - 50
Variety
It captures the dignity and the stubborness of the old man, and it is tender in his final defeat. And yet it isn’t a completely satisfying picture. There are long and arid stretches, when it seems as if producer and director were merely trying to fill time. - 50
Chicago Sun-Times
The real star is cinematographer James Wong Howe, who distracts us from the character's lulling conversations with himself -- and Tracy's grim voiceovers -- with his magisterial seascapes and sunsets. [18 Feb 1999, p.31] - 40
The New York Times
Whatever allegorical intimations there may be in it are not conveyed to any sensible degree in a voice narration that breaks in occasionally or in the mumblings of the old man. - 30
Time Out
A painfully sincere, meticulously faithful, and pitifully plodding adaptation of Hemingway's novel about the symbolic struggle between an old Mexican fisherman and a giant marlin.
