Frederic (Gary Cooper) is an American in Italy during the Great War. He is an ambulance driver. Upon returning from his recent stint at the front with many wounded in his ambulance, he meets his good friend, Rinaldi (Adolphe Menjou). Rinaldi has great plans to go out drinking and meeting the ladies, but asks for some money first. The pair meet some nurses. Frederic finds he is attracted to the one that Rinaldi has chosen, Catherine (Helen Hayes). He steals her from him, causing some hard feelings. In a flash, Frederic and Cahterine are in love, but he has to go back to the front. Seeing as Catherine is ruining his friendship with Frederic, Rinaldi has her reassigned to Milan. Meanwhile, on the front, Frederic has been wounded. After patching him up, Rinaldi sends him to Milan for recovery; clearly, he feels guilty now that his friend is injured.
The movie feels incomplete and disjointed. There are some things that the viewer must figure out for himself. Frederic and Catherine are lovers and she is pregnant. Nope, can't have that in a movie. There are multiple flash-cuts, that clearly show something is missing. Often, I wasn't quite certain what was going on and why some of the characters were helping Frederic. Checking on IMDb, it shows that censors snipped some of the film and Hemingway was very unhappy with the results. However, he was impressed with Gary Cooper and suggested him for For Whom the Bell Tolls.
Cooper portrays the hunky American well and Menjou is great as Rinaldi. I loved how he kept calling Frederic 'Baby.' He was a very likeable Italian doctor. Helen Hayes was miscast. Her American accent didn't go with playing an English nurse. Also, the 5 foot tall Hayes was positively dwarfed by the 6'3" Cooper. I could see her attraction to him, but not his to her.
Mediocre.
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