talisencrw It was unique to come across this early Huston work. It's weird that today, three generations later, when Scarlett Johansson gets in trouble for being cast as an Asian, that this was long the practice. I've seen star Jennifer Jones here as a Cuban, and later in 'Love is a Many-Splendored Thing' as Eurasian.She and John Garfield (himself playing a Cuban-born American businessman and revolutionary supporter) had good chemistry, and the film was finely made. Worth purchasing and rewatching. It's an exquisite joy to watch the minor works by a great filmmaker, like the 30's British works of Sir Alfred Hitchcock.

ferbs54 Following 1948's "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre" (after all these years, STILL this viewer's favorite film of all time) and "Key Largo" (one of my personal Top 100), and right before working on one of the film noir greats, 1950's "The Asphalt Jungle," director John Huston came out with a comparatively lesser-known picture, 1949's "We Were Strangers." And, as it turns out, this is still another marvelous creation by a great filmmaker. His third movie in a row to be set in the tropics, it uses as its backdrop the Cuban revolution of 1933. For those viewers not familiar with the history of this event (I know I wasn't!), not to worry; the film tells us everything we need to know. In it, we meet a young Cuban woman named China (pronounced Cheena) Valdes (played by Jennifer Jones), who sees her brother shot dead on the steps of the university for distributing revolutionary pamphlets. His assassin is none other than the greatly feared Armando Ariete, a cold-blooded agent of the Porro, or secret police, chillingly played by the great Mexican actor Pedro Armendariz (who most modern-day viewers will know solely for his final role, that of Kerim Bey in "From Russia, With Love," another of my personal Top 100). Cheena, seeking vengeance, joins the revolutionary movement and enters into a plot hatched by a mysteriously motivated American, Tony Fenner (John Garfield). The plot: to dig a tunnel from her house to the neighboring cemetery, stuff one of the crypts with dynamite, kill a government official, and blow up all the massed heads of state at the resultant funeral. But things don't go quite as planned, in this remarkably suspenseful and exciting film.Clearly deserving a greater renown, "We Were Strangers" boasts many fine qualities. It has been beautifully shot in B&W, and Huston's direction throughout is of course first rate. He gives his gorgeous leading lady any number of stunning close-ups, and Jennifer herself does quite well at portraying a Cuban (at least, she is more convincing than Natalie Wood was as a Puerto Rican, in still another of my Top 100 films, "West Side Story"). While I agree with the Maltin book that Gilbert Roland steals the film playing Guillermo Mantilla, one of the revolutionaries, the single best scene in the picture might be the one in which Armendariz' slimy porrista (is that the word?) gets drunk in front of China, guzzling rum and stuffing his face with Morro crab while telling her of how his own mother is frightened of him. Some Oscar-worthy stuff here from Pedro! But then again, the acting by one and all, under Huston's direction, is just marvelous. The film builds to a blazing, smashing conclusion, and those viewers who want to see sweet Jennifer Jones--the saintly Sister Bernadette, the adorable Cluny Brown, the ethereal Jennie Appleton, the beloved Miss Dove--handle a machine gun and really blow 'em away need look no further! I just love the look on Jennifer's face as she mows them down; what an actress! Though the film can be justifiably accused of having a slightly rushed ending, it is still one that deserves to be better known today. Besides illuminating a seldom-mentioned slice of history, it is remarkably well done, gripping and, ultimately, quite moving. And yes, as he had done the year before in "Sierra Madre," that IS John Huston doing a quick cameo, here as China's fellow worker in a bank. In all, more than highly recommended!

writers_reign It's probable that this enterprise planted the seed that became White Hunter, Black Heart, throwing as it did screenwriter Peter Viertel and John Huston together several years before The African Queen. I seem to be in a minority here as most comments are highly favourable. I concede that it was brave in the extreme to make a pro-revolution movie at the time they did but other than that I find it on the dull side. Garfield especially is muted virtually throughout which goes completely against his screen persona of the virile, vitriolic short-fused hero and there is virtually no chemistry between him and Jennifer Jones, who comes close to reprising her Duel In The Sun shoot-out in the last reel. Gilbert Roland takes what acting honours there are in what for me is a curio rather than a lost gem.

dbdumonteil "We were strangers" is considered a minor film among all Huston's masterpieces of the era:"treasure of the Sierra Madre" "Key Largo" "Asphalt jungle'' or "African Queen" .But many of this director's works are sleepers :"a walk with love and death" "Heaven knows mister Allison" or " Reflections in a golden eye" -which was an accurate rendition of McCullers' novel- are good examples ,sometimes more praised abroad than in America."We were strangers " is in the center of Huston's work:one of his permanent features was failure ("treasure" "asphalt" "misfits" ).the heroes of "strangers" are in a way ,misfits:they do not mix with the people and they do not feel that history is moving faster than they do.Forget the political background which may seem,to some,naive and vague :sometimes we wonder whether the heroes themselves are believing in what they are doing:hear this little ditty one of them sings as a leitmotiv ("we are digging all day,we are digging all night" "We were strangers" shows Huston's fascination for death: it would reappear in the overlooked "walk with love and death" ,in the dance macabre at the beginning of " under the volcano" and it is even more glaring in the director's final opus "the dead' where one of the characters ,still alive,appears on her deathbed.Fighting against the tyrants is one good thing:doing so by digging a tunnel to get to a graveyard to kill one of the men of the dictatorship,Huston challenges realism!"there are two parts in the cemetery,says Jones ,one for the poor,one for the rich" even in death...Jones ,some kind of romantic passionnaria (the part was tailor made for her- and Garfield an idealist American are part of the odd couples who are numerous in Huston's work:"African queen" "Heaven knows..." or "Roots of heaven" or "the Barbarian and the geisha" or "Annie" or...you name it...a Huston which should not sink into oblivion....