It's Lean's direction that makes the production really pop. It's relentless, but fluid and deft, keeping us on our toes rather than wallowing in misery.
Comment
01/16/09
Oliver Twist (1948)
100
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:16
Fresh:16
Rotten:0
Average Rating:8.7/10
Synopsis: This lavish adaptation based on the Charles Dickens novel OLIVER TWIST is about an orphan boy who runs away from a workhouse and meets a pickpocket on the streets of London. Oliver is taken in by... [More]
Starring: Alec Guinness, Robert Newton, Anthony Newley, Kay Walsh
Director: David Lean
Reviews for Oliver Twist
1 - 18 (sorted by date; Australian critics are listed first)
Despite compression of characters and charges of Alec Guinness' anti-Semitic potrayal of Fagin, David Lean's version is still the most dramatically compelling, historically atmopsheric, and flawlessly acted.
03/25/08
Alec Guinness as the master pickpocket Fagin is the high point of David Lean's 1948 version of the Dickens classic.
11/06/07
From every angle this is a superb achievement.
11/06/07
Top CriticPerhaps marginally less beguiling than Great Expectations, but still a moving and enjoyable account of Dickens' masterpiece.
01/26/06
Definitely the version to see before you subject yourself, say, to Polanski's bloated 2005 version.
12/31/05
No review available.
11/06/05
Classic Dickens ... the definitive version. Please, sir, we want some more!
09/30/05
Click to read the article
09/18/05
Click to read the article
08/14/05
No review available.
04/28/05
No review available.
07/04/04
No review available.
06/23/04
The ultimate version of the Dickens novel.
10/01/03
Many of the novel's characters have been excised or compressed to fit the time frame of the film, but only the most die-hard Dickensians will protest.
07/30/03
It is safe to proclaim that it is merely a superb piece of motion picture art and, beyond doubt, one of the finest screen translations of a literary classic ever made.
05/20/03
Top CriticLean's black and white film plays much better on the screen than does Dickens' original text in high school literature classes.
02/26/03
Charles Dickens' novel rendered on the screen by an ambitious filmmaker, David Lean, is a flawed film of visual and emotional power.
01/01/00
1 - 18 (sorted by date; Australian critics are listed first)
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