Let's be realistic.

I wanted to but couldn't!

It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

Blistering performances.

From fancy French hotels to the mountains of Monaco, this action packed adventure involves religious symbols of healing, human greed and one man's determination to stop evil from catching up to him no matter what it takes. There are certain movies where it is plainly obvious from the opening credits who the hero is, and who the villain is. Obviously, Glenn Ford is the good guy, framed for murder simply because he stumbled upon the mystery of the green glove and got stuck with it. Now, it's his goal to get it back to the mountain top church where the bells have stopped ringing because of its theft. By accident, he hooks up with innocent Geraldine Brooks, all the while trying to outwit evil nobleman George MacReady, up to Hus usual sinister tricks, and determined to prevent Ford from completing his mission. Sometimes good, sometimes bad, Sir Cedric Hardwicke is the picture of nobility here, the vessel through whom the vessel is told. It's an interesting reunion for Ford and MacReady, but sadly, Brooks is no "Gilda". Some exciting train sequences are followed by the climactic scene on a steep mountain where evil and good come head to head. A bit too complex at times, this is entertaining but sometimes perplexing. Yet, the mystery comes nicely together, giving a satisfying conclusion that truly shows the miracle of the bells and the magic of the glove.

Being a fan of Glenn Ford, I sought out this unknown little film on DVD. I was hoping for at least a mediocre wrapping around which to view Ford. The comments here seem to be mostly lackluster and quick to point out detracting qualities of the film.However, after viewing, I am happy to say that I was pleasantly surprised. It's not an Oscar winner, but it is good entertainment. I enjoyed the scenario in which we see the end of the story playing out at the beginning, and then jump back in time to discover how we arrived at this end, and indeed, the truth of what we have witnessed.Early in the morning at a little mountain village in France, a priest is startled by the toll of bells coming from the church tower. The bells have not rung for centuries, since the gauntlet (the green glove) of a war hero to whom the church is dedicated had been stolen. They must only ring again when the gauntlet is returned. The priest runs into the church to find the gauntlet still missing. Wondering of the reason for the tolling, he runs up the tower, where he finds the body of a dead man. Proceeding up to the bells themselves, he finds them tolling vigorously but the tower empty. Puzzled and disturbed, the priest proceeds back down the tower, only to find the gauntlet safely in its place! What has happened here... why and how did the bells toll and the gauntlet reappear? Who is the dead man, and why is he dead? Is there a plausible explanation, or was it a mystical occurrence? As we watch the rest of the film, we will find out.While some have thought that the characters were shallow and uninvolved, I thought that the interaction between Ford and Brooks was entertaining, if not philosophically deep. This is a smart little suspense flick, and the plot provides enough curves and dips that my interest was easily held. I for one enjoyed the character of Geraldine Brooks -- the bubbly, energetic young lady who is attracted to Ford but unaware of the reasons for the events surrounding her. I also enjoyed the little hiatus at the secluded inn, where our protagonists play the parts of newlyweds.The things that I enjoyed the least while viewing were the print of the film on the DVD itself, and the rather intrusive and cheap score. Of course, the film is not to be blamed for the print (Alpha Video), but the viewing does suffer somewhat, as it is not a studio release. It is watchable, but both video and audio are rather murky. The score, however, I felt was overbearing at times and reminded me of a the dramatic score of a cheap 30's B western.All-in-all, however, very worth viewing. Particularly if you are a fan of suspense or Glenn Ford, and can bear a less-than-perfect print. Recommended.

****SPOILERS**** Over-plotted and ridicules movie about a relic green glove that's the object of the films jewelry hunt up and down the mountains hills railroads and goat tracks of central and southern France. In the film Michael Blake, Glen Ford, sees the light in the end, or you can also say beginning, of the movie and returns the valuable glove to the Abbey of St. Elzear where it was lost for seven years during the last days of the Second World War. With that unselfish deed Michael made the Abbey's bells ring again.Long, even though the film is under 90 minutes, and senseless movie that stretches it's story with a snoozing train ride and a unintentionally hilarious chase up and down the steep and dangerous goat track by the St. Elzear Abbey. At that time Michael is persuade by Count Paul Rona, George Macready, and his hoods to get their hands on the green glove that's in his possession. The movie ends, like it started, with the bells ringing at the Abbey's bell tower as the green glove was returned to it. In fact the ending was not what you thought it was from what you saw at the beginning of the film. Michael got involved with the green glove when he dropped in on St. Elzear, back in August 1944, as a US paratrooper. After taking Rona, who he caught stealing it, prisoner as a German spy the ceiling suddenly crashed down on him, after being hit by an artillery shell, with Rona fleeing and Michael ending up with the green glove. Michael left it, the glove, with some towns-people who had no idea what was in the satchel that Michael gave them as he took off to the more important grind of fighting and winning the war. Coming back to Paris after the war was over Michael tries to get things right by having the green glove returned, after he finds those who he gave it to, gets involved in a number of murders which he and his girlfriend and tourist guide Chris, Geraldine Brooks, were framed for by the devious Rona. Rona and his thugs followed Michael to France in order to get the green glove for himself. Michael also gets beaten up and knocked around with him falling through a glass sky-window. Later he almost drinks himself blind drunk in his effort to return the green glove back to it's rightful owners, the people of St. Elzear . Michael is reunited with Chris at the end of the movie and even with all the physical endurance and battering around that he went through in the film his hair is still oiled and so neat that not one single strand is left out of place.

Plenty of points of interest went into The Green Glove – a seasoned cast, locations in France (Paris, the Midi), a dangerous quest for a fabulous artifact. But not much energy was expended on making them interesting. It's easy to lose track of who wants what and who killed whom in this lackluster thriller, and hard to care.Good cinematographer turned so-so director Rudoph Maté cast one of his favorite subjects, Glenn Ford, as a soldier caught up in the liberation of France. There Ford captures but loses George Macready (his old adversary from Gilda, which Maté photographed). Of vague nationality and dubious loyalties, Macready was trying to abscond with the story's Maltese Falcon – a priceless gauntlet which has reposed in a village church for centuries. Ford takes custody of it but, injured, leaves it behind with the family who rescued him.When post-war prosperity stateside doesn't catch up with Ford, he returns to France in hopes of retrieving the gauntlet and with it his fortune. From the moment his feet hit French soil (having apparently been under close surveillance for years), Macready's men start following him around; the police grow interested when one of them is found dead in Ford's hotel room. With the effervescent Geraldine Brooks in tow, he sets out by the Blue Train to the Riviera, dodging both the law and Macready's mob. There's an early scene set high up in the Eiffel Tower, and, for the resolution, Maté keeps his camera high, taking us to the sheer precipices of a goat trail and to the bell tower of the burgled church (wanly anticipating Hitchcock in both North by Northwest and Vertigo).But the film jumps from one thing to another like those mountain goats leaping from crag to crag (fatally losing its footing in one coy, comic scene at a country inn where Ford and Brooks feign being newlyweds with bridal-night jitters). More crucially, the characters stay blandly generic, with no feel for their quirks or insight into their motives (and Sir Cedric Hardwicke is thrown away as a country priest). The Green Glove of the quest is the real McCoy, unlike the Maltese Falcon, which was a fake; in this case, the paste is worth far more than the diamonds.