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From the Terrace movie storyline. In Philadelphia in 1946, Alfred Eaton returns home from the war to find his mother Martha a wretched alcoholic, the victim of years of neglect and abuse from her husband Samuel, the owner of a prestigious iron and steel company. Samuel emotionally withdrew from his family thirteen years earlier after the death of his beloved son Billy, and still resents the fact that Billy died while Alfred lives.
When Samuel begrudgingly offers Alfred a position in the family business, Alfred states that he is moving to New York to launch an aircraft business with his old friend Lex Porter. While attending a party at the estate of Lex’s wealthy uncle, Fritz Thornton, Arthur spots Mary St. John, the stunning daughter of a Main Line family. Mary, who is secretly engaged to Dr. Jim Roper, is sexually drawn to Alfred, and soon the two are embroiled in a tempestuous relationship.
When Mary’s snobbish parents object that Alfred’s father is a nobody and his mother is a drunk, Mary defies them and continues to see Alfred. After Alfred asks his father for a loan to finance his share of the aircraft company, Samuel humiliates Alfred and begins to sob for the lost Billy. Furious, Alfred storms out in disgust, after which Samuel suffers a heart attack and is hospitalized. Believing that Samuel’s ill health will place Alfred closer to the helm of the Eaton Steel company, Mr. St. John condones his daughter’s engagement to Alfred.
On the day of the wedding, Alfred receives word that his father has died. Certain that Samuel has timed his death to spite him, Alfred goes ahead with the ceremony. With Thornton money, Lex and Alfred then fund the Nassau Aircraft Corporation, but when Lex shows more interest in perfecting aircraft designs than in selling planes, Alfred, hungry for riches, becomes impatient.
One winter day, Alfred and Mary are driving home from a party at the Thornton estate when they see a little boy fall through the thin ice of a frozen pond. After Alfred plunges into the icy waters to save the boy, the boy’s grandfather, James Duncan MacHardie, the most famous financier in America, invites Alfred and Mary to dinner. MacHardie, a shrewd businessman, senses Alfred’s drive and ambition, and when Alfred asserts that his goal in life is to earn more money than his father, MacHardie offers him a job in his investment firm.
Obsessed by success, Alfred travels the country for MacHardie, leaving Mary alone for months at a time. Mary, lonely and self-pitying, begins to resent Alfred’s constant absences. When Creighton Duffy, MacHardie’s son-in law, whose position in his father-in-law’s business is threatened by Alfred’s acumen, suggests that Alfred spend two months in rural Pennsylvania counseling investment to Ralph Benziger, a prosperous coal mine owner, Alfred finds his marriage to Mary irretrievably broken.
After an ugly argument with Mary, Alfred goes to Pennsylvania, and one night, is invited to dinner at Benziger’s, where he meets Benziger’s compassionate, ingenious daughter Natalie. Overwhelmed by Natalie’s sensitivity, Alfred impetuously invites her to a movie, but she refuses. Later that night, however, Natalie phones Alfred at his hotel room and arranges to meet him at a drive-in the following evening.
From the Terrace is a 1960 American DeLuxe Color drama film in CinemaScope directed by Mark Robson, and starring Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward, Myrna Loy, Ina Balin, George Grizzard, and Leon Ames, with a young Barbara Eden appearing in one scene.
The screenplay was written by Ernest Lehman, based on the 1958 novel by John O’Hara that tells the story of the estranged son of a Pennsylvania factory owner who marries into a prestigious family and moves to New York to seek his fortune. This was the third movie that real-life spouses Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward made together.
From the Terrace (1960)
Directed by: Mark Robson
Starring: Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward, Myrna Loy, Ina Balin, Leon Ames, Elizabeth Allen, Barbara Eden, George Grizzard, Patrick O’Neal, Felix Aylmer, Malcolm Atterbury, Raymond Greenleaf
Screenplay by: Ernest Lehman
Cinematography by: Leo Tover
Film Editing by: Dorothy Spencer
Costume Design by: Travilla
Set Decoration by: Paul S. Fox, Walter M. Scott
Art Direction by: Maurice Ransford, Howard Richmond, Lyle R. Wheeler
Makeup Department: Ben Nye, Helen Turpin
Music by: Elmer Bernstein
MPAA Rating: None.
Distributed by: 20th Century Fox
Release Date: July 15, 1960
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