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6 Degrees Entertainment

The Bridge of San Luis Rey
(Judith Anderson, Theodore Bikel, Hume Cronyn, Rita Gam, Viveca Lindfors, et al / DVD / NR / (1958) 2021 / Liberation Hall - MVD Visual)

Overview: A friar is tried by the Inquisition for questioning God’s intentions when five die in the collapse of an Andean bridge. In early 18th century Peru (1714), an old Inca rope bridge over a gorge in the Andes, collapses, plunging five travelers to their deaths.

Brother Juniper, who was within minutes of being on the bridge himself, becomes obsessed with discovering how five people of differing class and circumstances came to be on the bridge at that moment.

The Catholic friar wants to know if it was mere existential happenstance or part of God’s cosmic plan. After researching the lives of the victims for five years and publishing his findings in a book, he is accused of heresy by the worldly Archbishop of Lima and put on trial for his life by the Inquisition.

DVD Verdict: This wondrous b/w teleplay is set in the early 1700s in Peru. An old rope bridge over a gorge collapses, killing five persons. Brother Juniper conducts a lengthy investigation of the lives and backgrounds of the five victims. The play follows Juniper’s investigation and examines the lives prior to the accident.

A church council then examines Brother Juniper’s book recounting his findings and determines the book to be heresy. Thus both Brother Juniper and his book are publicly burned.

The program was broadcast by CBS on January 21st, 1958, as part of the television series, DuPont Show of the Month. Robert Mulligan was the director and the production was reported to have used a record number of cameras and was watched by an incredible 47% share of the available audience.

Watching it again today here on DVD, it is obvious why it was so highly praised at the time for its lush production standards and trio of overall quality, taste and acting competence.

With some of the on screen performances resonating as simply inspirational and out and out magnificent, I would be at journalistic fault here if I didn’t single out Judith Anderson and Eva Le Galliene, in particular.

I mean, back then, I wonder if television had not known many such moments as those that were being acted out on screen here, for those two noted actors were on top of their game from the off.

Also I should pay mentioned to Theodore Bikel as Capt. Alvarado, yet another stand out performance from the TV regular for decades, and the trio of Hume Cronyn as Uncle Pio, Steven Hill as Esteban, and an excellent, almost transcendent Viveca Lindfors as Camilla, la Perichole. This is a Full Screen Presentation (1.33:1) enhanced for 16x9 TVs.

www.LiberationHall.com

www.MVDvisual.com





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