From the Terrace

1960

2h 24m

Drama

List

31%

13 Reviews

Tomatometer

59%

1,000+ Ratings

Audience Score

Alfred Eaton (Paul Newman) returns home after World War II, driven to be as successful as possible out of hatred toward his wealthy father (Leon Ames). He is unendingly ambitious: founding an aircraft construction company with his friend Lex (George Grizzard), marrying a socialite (Joanne Woodward) and leveraging a fortunate encounter with a powerful financier (Felix Aylmer) into a new career. When he meets the beautiful, truthful Natalie (Ina Balin), Alfred has a crisis of conscience.

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Kevin O

I absolutely loved this film! And it was real scandalous, too! 🤣 I was flipping through the channels and decided to watch it on a humbug. Paul Newman is one of my favorite actors and I really enjoyed his performance.

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

10/13/23

Full Review

Mark N

Perhaps I view the movie with the sense of old Tom Hollywood and that movies don't have to reflect accurately or precisely everyday life but that Hollywood and the movies are about entertainment most often. Given as much, I enjoyed the movie very much. The acting. The story. The idealistic and yet in many ways realistic ending. Greed, sex, love and belonging are the strongest themes and are evident constantly throughout the film. I found myself inspired and moved by the caring genuine character betrayal by Natalie (lovely Ina Balin). Without thinking about it for more than one half minute,I would rate the movie as high as I suspect any love story I have seen on screen. Maybe I'm a product of my time and age but there is no way I can give a low 31% rating to this film; on immediate impulse after watching the movie I would have to rate it an 88% at the least. I think the movie speaks to a noble and honest loving relationship that might have been aspired for by society at the time it was filmed, but perhaps that time, much like the story of Camelot, was one brief shining moment and perhaps day to day life for far too many people is as H.D. Thoreau said, a life of 'quiet desperation.' I enjoyed the movie, and was delighted to see a thing Ina Balin in a film exhibit her talent along side other talented actors.

Rated 4 out of 5 stars

08/04/22

Full Review

John H

From the Terrace is, of course, not fresh on the screen. It was made in my world, in a time of more authentic lives. No exploding car chases and gunfire. Unbridled passions....all designed to rivet your attention for a brief while and leave you gasping. Instead, I watched a pleasant story by a talented author, re-scripted with a certain style and dignity for what was once revered as the 'silver screen'. Lives certainly much different from mine. It gave me a look at people who I was pleased to think of as real in their world while understanding full well it was never thicker than everyday, paper-thin Hollywood. That's why Hollywood is Hollywood....there to crank up passions which appeal to a wide array of welcoming minds. It was easy to buy into the relationship between Alfred and Natalie. To dislike Mrs. Eaton and Dr. Roper. Every character played to perfection, their origins lifted from John O'Hara's novel. I'll enjoy watching From the Terrace again next year.

Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars

01/09/21

Full Review

steve d

The acting makes it work.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

03/30/23

Full Review

Audience Member

You'll never forget Myrna Loy's performance.

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

01/14/23

Full Review

Audience Member

Just as disappointing as the other John O'Hara novel made into a movie that year, Butterfield 8 with Liz Taylor, but without that film's melodramatic juice, though Paul Newman is well cast as the ambitious, upwardly mobile man in moral crisis.

Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars

01/25/23

Full Review

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Mark Robson

Director

Paul Newman

David Alfred Eaton

Joanne Woodward

Mary St. John

Myrna Loy

Martha Eaton

Ina Balin

Natalie Benzinger

Leon Ames

Samuel Eaton

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Variety Staff

Variety

From The Terrace builds up to one big cliche.

Jun 17, 2008

Full Review

Time Out

Robson's film is still highly watchable, with Paul and Joanne pretending their marriage is on the rocks, and all sorts of machinations in the boardroom and the bedroom.

Jan 26, 2006

Full Review

Howard Thompson

New York Times

This is a handsome picture, well-performed and emotionally intriguing as it describes the rise of a young business man and the corrosive dead-lock of his loveless marriage.

Rated: 4/5

May 9, 2005

Full Review

Clyde Gilmour

Maclean's Magazine

Another bulky novel, this one with a contemporary American locale, has been turned into a long, expensive movie - but the results are only occasionally absorbing.

Nov 7, 2019

Full Review

Nathanael Hood

The Retro Set

Scintillates and wounds with the scale and ambition of a CinemaScope epic and the intimacy of an old school Hollywood weepie.

Rated: 8/10

Dec 28, 2018

Full Review

Isabel Quigly

The Spectator

Few novelists film as disastrously as John O'Hara; From the Terrace has everything that makes for overblown filming: every giant cliche you can think of.

May 9, 2018

Full Review

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Synopsis

Alfred Eaton (Paul Newman) returns home after World War II, driven to be as successful as possible out of hatred toward his wealthy father (Leon Ames). He is unendingly ambitious: founding an aircraft construction company with his friend Lex (George Grizzard), marrying a socialite (Joanne Woodward) and leveraging a fortunate encounter with a powerful financier (Felix Aylmer) into a new career. When he meets the beautiful, truthful Natalie (Ina Balin), Alfred has a crisis of conscience.

Director: Mark Robson
Screenwriter: Ernest Lehman
Genre: Drama
Original Language: English
Release Date (Streaming): Jul 1, 2011
Runtime: 2h 24m

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