and stilted about this film, and its casting.Jason Robards who always delivers, just seems wooden and ineffectual as Dick Diver. Jennifer Jones as the ever desirable, but tragic Nicole Diver, just seems unsympathetic, even strident and cruel.The alcohol flows freely and the jet-set lifestyle is invoked by a humorous Tom Ewell, who sings the movies theme song at the beginning of this disjointed movie. (Tom Ewell is forever planted in my memory as Marilyn Monroes bumbling neighbor in "The Seven Year Itch", or as the silly, clichéd father in "State Fair") That being said, it almost seems as if the writers did not know how to treat the subject of psychoanalysis and mental illness. F Scott Fitgerald and his wife endured tragedy, his wife Zelda Sayre Fitgerald was diagnosed with schizophrenia while still in her 20's. She was delusional at times, and probably never walked around at all times looking like a John Robert Powers model,(as Jones does in this movie).It was 1962 after all, psychoanalysis was chic and stylish, so this film presents the illness as stylish and merely the effect of being rich and bored on the French Riviera. I wanted to like this film, but it is sorely dated and due for a remake. If nothing else it aptly demonstrates society stigma and misconceptions when portraying mental illness. No wonder there is still so much denial, if this film was considered an acceptable story of a physician and his wife in 1962. Worth seeing as a curiosity. 5/10.

TENDER IS THE NIGHT is best appreciated less as an adaptation of the Fitzgerald novel than as an original work. At the time it was made, 1962, many of Fitzgerald's themes were still considered beyond what would be allowed on the screen. Instead, producer David O. Selznick sought a vehicle to showcase his wife, actress Jennifer Jones, and other stars were cast who were not ideal representations of the characters Fitzgerald had imagined. Veteran director Henry King, whose career dated back to the 1910s, had a long tenure as the leading house director at Twentieth Century-Fox. With this film King for the first time had a producer who attempted to dictate how shooting should be done, and he and Selznick clashed. The resulting long film satisfied neither man, and it was the last film of both.Nonetheless, TENDER IS THE NIGHT, in its own right, memorably depicts the crumbling of a talented man of promising future, played by Jason Robards as therapist to wealthy Jones in a sanitarium. Against his better judgment, the two fall in love and he agrees to marry her, despite the breach of professional standards. Over the course of their marriage, Robards loses his intellectual drive and becomes increasingly dependent on Jones, who, although she had begun desperately needing his guidance and love, gradually transforms. Jones becomes a strong, independent woman, and ultimately leaves behind the man who began as her mentor but who has lost the very qualities which attracted her to him. Yet Jones's full recovery from sanitarium to be capable of life on her own is a result of the same marriage that proved disastrous for Robards, and the complex, shifting nature of power and ambition in their union, and its personal outcome, provides an absorbing, cautionary romantic parable.

**spoiler alert**This movie does not have the greatest reputation in the world. I'd read that Jennifer Jones was too old to play Nicole, that she overacts, that she has no chemistry with Jason Robards, that it was too long, etc.Well don't believe it!It DID take me several attempts to watch the whole thing, but that nothing to do with the movie, that had to do with something else. WhenI finally saw the whole thing all the way through, I enjoyed it very much and questioned why it does not have more admirers.It explores many themes, thoughtfully and without exploitation. Should a doctor romance his patient? When does the patient stop being a patient, exactly, and start being a person? Nicole meets Dick in a sanitarium. She's there for a variety of reasons, none of which sister Joan Fontaine really care to discuss. It has something to do with their father. Nicole eventually is released and runs into Dick years later, and they get married. They have a wonderful life and two children but it starts to fall apart. Not because of Nicole's mental state - actually, as it turns out, she becomes the stable one. But a friend of theirs (Tom Ewell, making a fool of himself as a chronic drunk) dies, their daughter almost dies from alcohol poisoning, and Dick is see with an actress (Jill St. John) at a brawl in a café and their picture makes all the front pages.Jennifer Jones is prone to be very mannered. In spite of them she's still a favorite, but here she's really very good, she's not too old to play the part, and her chemistry with Robards is believable. Fontaine doesn't do much but enjoy her own wardrobe. As I mentioned, Ewell is a drunk but his death scene (or, rather, the circumstances surrounding it) are the worse thing in the movie. Jill St. John is first seen as a youngster but she matures as the movie progresses..unfortunately, her acting does not improve. At over 2 1/2 hours, its an investment, but worth your time. Now I want to watch it again. 8/10.

When this was released I managed to see most films first-run, except the ones clearly aimed at my age group. (Such a snob, n'est-ce pas?!?) So, being a fan of both Jennifer and Joan, I went to a Los Angeles-area theater with top-notch projection and sound. Back then Twentieth-Century Fox rarely stinted on sending companies to the actual locales of the stories being filmed, so this one has plenty of its share of gorgeous shots set in Switzerland and elsewhere on the Continent, as I recall.But, as other comments herein attest, the rest is somewhat of a disappointment. Henry King, the director, seemed to encourage Jennifer Jones in some of her less-attractive mannerisms which somehow were not so apt as a rendition of her character's mental distress. Jason Robards, Jr. was never much of a success as a romantic lead, in my opinion. And Joan Fontaine was assigned the rather thankless role of a rich "bitch." All in all it's a prime example of how the studio "system" was growing out of touch with an ever-younger movie audience. Nevertheless for those of us who have always appreciated luxurious eye candy, it was a fairly tasty treat.