Reflections in a Golden Eye (A Review)

I am a pretty big Marlon Brando fan. He's just such a great actor. But he was certainly in his share of flops and the film Reflections in a Golden from 1967 was originally considered to be one of them. Maybe it was the controversial subject matter or the sort slow place the film moves at. It certainly could have been the rather creepy atmosphere and the ominous presence of Robert Forster as Private Williams. This movie has a southern Gothic vibe to it that sort of reminded me of the Clint Eastwood flick The Beguiled, but that particular movie had a more horror and suspense type of vibe while Reflections in a Golden Eye is more understated in its approach. At the heart of this movie (as in The Beguiled) is sex and the battle with certain sexual urges. 

Marlon Brando plays a quiet major in the US Army and Elizabeth Taylor plays his rambunctious wife. Brando's character is prone to odd behavior and his wife appears to be very bored with him. For this reason she has an affair with a colonel (Brian Keith) who lives next door and Brando, seemingly oblivious to the whole thing, keeps inviting the colonel and the colonel's troubled wife (Julie Harris) into his home. Julie Harris suspects her husband is cheating on her, but no one seems to trust her because of her deteriorating mental health. 

Of course, we have Robert Forster as Private Williams as the voyeur who watches these things go on and  he begins to develop an obsession with Elizabeth Taylor's character after accidently seeing her nude. Forster begins to make nightly visits to the house of the estranged couple and begins sneaking into the wife's room to sniff her nighties while she sleeps, often staring at her until the sun rises before sneaking out of the house. 

It is only when Julie Harris sees a man entering the house of the major does Harris suspect something is amiss. 

Then things get further complicated when Brando catches the disturbed private riding bare-assed on a horse in the woods (something the private apparently does often) and Brando's character develops a bit of an obsession for that man. And the inevitable confrontation comes from this simple formula: What happens when Brando discovers that the man he has a crush on secretly sneaks into his house and watches over his own wife? 

This is pretty heavy subject matter. Ahead of its time type of stuff. I could certainly see shades of Equus with all of the horse imagery involved and I'm certain this movie (and the book it was based on) had to have been an influence. At least a small one. 

Brando is really good in this movie and he plays a repressed homosexual rather well. The accent he has is pretty decent, too. Elizabeth Taylor is perfectly at home in her role too and I wish that the lighting would have been just a little bit better during her nude scene. Unlike Brando's character, seeing a bare-assed dude on horseback isn't exactly my idea of a good time, but a nude Elizabeth Taylor? Good God.

That little bit of nitpicking aside I really enjoyed this movie. It certainly is creepy and the odd black and white with a heavy golden tint that this movie has is pretty effective.