stedder-54453 A well-made and entertaining movie, as others have said, with gorgeous Big Sur photography. There is one amusing discrepancy, which is that Laura is forever rattling on about how she teaches Danny to disobey unjust laws and to have a reverence for life. (I'm paraphrasing here.) But the kid's in trouble for shooting a deer! Without a license! While under age, probably out of season!Now most people don't think the fish and game laws are unjust, and shooting a deer hardly shows reverence for life, so her lessons aren't getting across. But nobody in authority brings this up to her, either the judge who's putting him in St. Simeon's School, or the headmaster thereof. I think in real life, the judge would certainly say, "Here's why I'm putting him in school. He's poaching deer, which are living things, and protected as public property, and you have failed in your duty to keep him from committing crimes, especially when firearms are involved!" Especially since she's such a sanctimonious, argumentative know-it-all, with a huge chip on her shoulder. But that doesn't occur to anyone in this movie, probably because the kid is just a plot device to get Burton and Taylor together.

marilyn5825 O my goodness ! ! the scenery is AWESOME, BEAUTIFUL, i think i was holding my breath at times... also the passion between Elizabeth and Richard !!! was that acting or (wow) ! some of the lines Elizabeth said really can make one think about true love.,i wonder if they were married at the time when this was filmed., every time Richard looked at her , he looked like he was going to pass out with love., and the director (WOW) directors like Vincent is the reason IM IN LOVE with movies . BUT NOW here is the question ??? does anybody know whose house they used on that cliff in Big Surf to film that ???? did the house belong to MGM or was it a private owner ?

tieman64 One of director Vincente Minnelli's more interesting films, "The Sandpiper" stars Elizabeth Taylor as Laura Reynolds, a free-spirited mother who lives with her youngest son Danny. Laura – the film is very heavy-handed – is a full blown hippie. She's super liberated, is a single mom, atheist, home-schools her kid, lives on the beach, is a painter, promiscuous, hates social norms, her best friend is black and she hangs out with radicals. Oh, and she flaunts her boobs. Damn those beatniks.Mirrored to Laura is Dr Edward Hewitt (Richard Burton), the headmaster of an Episcopal boarding school. Edward is, of course, an ultra conservative. He's everything Laura isn't: rigid, a stickler for rules and regulations, an authoritarian, fundamentalist, traditionalist and stuck in a loveless marriage.Laura and Edward fall in love, but Laura's unconventionality and uninhibitedness disturbs Edward. He begins to have a crisis of faith. When the couple have sex one night, both fall apart. He questions the principles he's always held, she can't believe she's fallen for a man who represents everything she abhors. Realizing the hypocrisy of being a local authority figure who represents charity, religion and decency but takes bribes and bends to the whispers of women and money, Edward scuttles his job. He begins to spend more time with Laura. Maybe she can fix him. Big mistake. Edward's wife learns of the couple's liaisons and Edward is publicly shamed. He's pushed out of town. It's all very melodramatic.Look beyond the lust and you have one of Minnelli's more political films; a film about the political Left and Right recognising that, gee, maybe the Right should relax and the Left should appreciate a little discipline. The film's title refers to a bird which Laura heals and sets free. Laura teaches Edward as she heals this bird, the woman then releasing both into the wild. The film ends with Laura on a beach, Edward high above her on a hill. Symbolically the two positions they represent cannot meet or be reconciled. And so Edward stands on a rock, a mountain face epitomising his rigidity and spiritual arrogance. Laura sits below him, an outsider."The Sandpiper" oozes the era in which it was made. Only in this particular zeitgeist would you have a homosexual director making a politically charged beatnik flick which criticised catholic figureheads, was brazenly sexual, hinged on infidelity and featured Charles Bronson as a gypsy hippie. Minnelli's style is also wonderfully over the top. This is SUPER MELODRAMA, his direction deliberately operatic, campy, baroque and hyper stylised. It's the kind of film which uses crashing waves as a metaphor for sex and giant boobs as a symbol for all that is self-assured womanness. Everything's BIG BIG BIG. Voluptuous. Lurid. Modern audiences unaccustomed to this style have criticised Minnelli, but that was always part of his charm.Some of Minnelli's symbolism is subtle. Urban centres, houses and hard buildings are constantly clashed with more naturalistic, soft locales. This left/right paradigm informs most shots. And while the sandpiper and Edward are set free, Minnelli shows that both seek only to return to their own jails. Edward can't break free of his narrow world view, responds to meeting Laura by disappearing further into his marriage, further into church duties, and Laura is the same. Have they changed? Sure. Laura for the first time paints human beings in her paintings and Edward has started asking questions. But Minnelli is careful to show that conciliation leads only to social marginalisation and isolation. Ultimately, there is no progress here, only TOTAL, and FURTHER entrenchment. To change too much is too violent, there is no common future and the duo remain opposed. As with the majority of Minnelli's other films, it is song, dance and art which bridges opposites and helps bring people together, if only temporarily.8/10 – Worth one viewing.

treeline1 Laura (Elizabeth Taylor) is a free-spirited painter with a troubled son who gets sent to a religious school run by a strict cleric (Richard Burton). Laura dislikes authority figures and flaunts her "wicked ways," much to the consternation-and delight-of the good Reverend. Their affair is a foregone conclusion, played out against the crashing surf of Big Sur.The highlight of the movie is the dramatic location of Big Sur, which, in 1965, was considered the place to be for artists and beatniks. The lax morals of Laura and her friends (including Charles Bronson) were pretty shocking back then, and fans rushed to the theatre to see Liz and Dick heat up the screen. Unfortunately, the script is so dopey that the actors aren't believable and their emotions fall flat despite Liz's shrieking and silly British accent.The little subplot of healing an injured bird is sweet but becomes laughable when it nests in Taylor's hair during a torrid love scene.Bottom line: Beautiful music and scenery; corny dialogue and ham acting.