I thought the title A Walk With Love And Death might be a metaphor – that the "walk" might stand for a journey or a quest, or perhaps even someone's lifetime, with various romances and fatalities along the way. In fact, the title is an absolutely literal description of what the film is about - the story follows a disillusioned student in the Middle Ages as he walks to the sea, encountering love and death en route. It is a very picaresque story, similar to the books that Tobias Smollett was writing in the 18th century (though in this case it is based on a novel by 20th century Dutch novelist Hans Koninsberger). John Huston is the unlikely director behind it, and he brings a modern sensibility to the proceedings – his film is more concerned with Flower-Power, Peace & Love and the 60s Youth Movement than the barbarism of the Middle Ages.During the Hundred Years War, student Heron of Fois (Assi Dayan) marches out of a lecture in Paris and decides to walk across his war-torn country to the sea. It is a long trek, and even though it takes him through beautiful landscapes there are constant reminders of the scars of war. Dead bodies drift by in rivers, cattle lies slaughtered in the fields and castles burn on the horizon. During the trip Heron meets a beautiful young noble-woman, Claudia (Anjelica Huston), who eventually joins him on his journey to the sea. Neither of them has ever set eyes on the sea before, but both share a foolish dream that if they can somehow get there all their problems will be resolved. However, the land becomes increasingly dangerous as peasant armies rise up in revolt against the soldiery, and the young companions gradually realise that their quest is doomed to fail.Huston's film is very personal, too much so to be a commercial success at the time. Having said that, some of the remarkably negative reviews that have been written about it are hardly fair. It is true that the story is very minor and insubstantial; it is true that the two leads are awfully wooden in their roles; it is true too that Dayan's character is completely unbelievable in a Middle Ages setting with his saintly "make-peace-not-war" attitude. Yet in spite of these flaws, there are still things to enjoy in A Walk With Love And Death. It is a beautifully shot film, with eye-catching colours and backgrounds captured in luscious DeLuxe by Ted Scaife (of The Dirty Dozen and Khartoum). Georges Delerue provides a haunting score, and Huston generates some fairly realistic scenes of hysteria and combat (one sequence, in which a man is quartered, is notably gruesome, albeit in a non-gratuitous way). While the film is not in the very top tier of the director's work, it certainly doesn't deserve to have been neglected as much as it has. It is perhaps best summed up as a worthy flop.

Walk with Life and Death, A (1969) ** (out of 4)When people discuss the great or awful films in the career of John Huston, this effort here rarely gets mentioned and that's probably because even the most die-hard Huston fan either hasn't sat through it or simply can't make it through. Apparently Huston selected to do this as something small and personal and one does have to respect him for trying a poetic movie like this but in the end the thing just didn't work for me. A man (Assaf Dayan) "hears" the "calls" of the sea and decides to leave Paris and walk to it. Along the way he encounters various forms of violence and a blooming relationship with a young woman (Anjelica Huston) who soon joins him on his journey. This film wasn't popular when it was first released and it seems very few people have bothered checking it out since then even though we've got a legendary director and his famous daughter in her first role. From the reviews I've read there appear to be a few fans of the film and it's poetic vision but for me the thing was a pretty big misfire. One of the biggest problems is Anjelica who is simply way out of her range in this type of part. This would have been a challenging role for anyone let alone someone making their first acting appearance. At times she seems all over the place while at other times she seems as if she doesn't know where to turn. Dayan doesn't fair much better but at least he seems at ease going through everything on this journey. The film moves at a rather slow pace, which I didn't really mind as Huston was trying to build some atmosphere out of it. The dialogue, cinematography and even the music score are all used to be dream-like but it just never really came together for me. This isn't an awful movie or an embarrassing one but it just felt too empty for me.

This is a fairly dry, low budget medieval picture by John Huston and starring his daughter Angelica...LOOOONG before she emerged as one of our great actresses. She's very awkward here, and the role is awkwardly written and the whole thing simply doesn't work.I have read some things Angelica herself wrote about this film -- that her father was often not active in her life, and that he wanted to do this film to sort of make things up to her, i.e., allow her to star in something he was doing. Also, that it was made to some degree to piggy-back on the popularity of Zeffirelli's '68 "Romeo and Juliet", which created a brief interest in romance films in medieval settings. That makes perfect sense, but the film "A Walk with Love and Death" doesn't work on any of those levels, unfortunately.A rather sad waste of some amazing talent. Knowing what Angelica has become, you have to wonder what she could have done acting-wise under different circumstances. Also, it's particularly unkind to cast a young woman of her looks -- interesting, but harsh and definitely not "pretty" -- in this sort of role, where her lack of prettiness seems at odds with the character. You can't help but feel sorry for her here! You can file this one under "every dad thinks his daughter is beautiful", right next to Sophie Coppola's debut in "Godfather 3". (And nothing against either amazingly talented lady, but this further proves that nepotism not only is a bad idea, but IT DOESN'T WORK.)

Brilliant evocation of youth in a time of social disruption. Angelica Huston's best work. Fascinating direction by John Huston. Based on an excellent novel. Well realized. Good depiction of medieval society. All in all, well worth seeing.