Gentlemen's Agreement (1947): B-

Review:

Gentlemen’s Agreement (1947):
Grade: B-

Again this won’t be long. I was interested in this film; however I just was not crazy about it. I felt that the romance between Gregory Peck and Dorothy McGuire felt like it was going in circles. It felt odd to me that Peck’s character was so amazed by the prejudices happening it was as if he had not noticed before. The film also seems to put an emphasis on the Jews being the same as the Catholics and Protestants; as in you cannot tell the difference unless you are told and that is why it is wrong. But what about people who do look different; is it okay to discriminate them? The film felt like it was not emphasizing that aspect enough. Peck was great but I felt that the most interesting aspects of the film were the characters played by Celeste Holm, John Garfield and Ann Revere. Celeste Holm is one of my favorite classic actresses and she won an Oscar here. John Garfield played Peck’s buddy and Ann Revere played Peck’s mother. Each of them was fantastic and their scenes and characters I actually found more interesting than the main conflicts. Overall an interesting film, definitely effective on several levels but it just feels like it does not carry the punch that it must have when the film came out.