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Maria, a tomboyish postulant at the Abbey in Salzburg, is told by the Abbess that she should try to resolve her feelings about her vocation, and is sent off as governess to the Trapp family. Arriving at the family villa, she discovers that Captain von Trapp, a retired naval officer and widower, rules his seven children with strict discipline. The atmosphere is chilly to begin with, but Maria gains the confidence of the children, takes them on picnics and teaches them to sing. Although the stern Captain is at last won over, he refuses the request of his friend, Max, to enter them in the Salzburg Festival. At the same time, he begins to take an interest in Maria which upsets his new love, a Baroness from Salzburg, who senses that Maria is also infatuated. After talking with the Baroness, the confused Maria returns to the Abbey, but the Abbess consoles her and sends her back to find her true love. The Captain and the children are delighted, the Baroness makes a graceful withdrawal, and the wedding takes place in Salzburg Cathedral. Their honeymoon coincides with the Anschluss and, on their return, the Captain (who is a strong anti-Nazi) finds himself in opposition to the local Gauleiter. When ordered to join a navy unit, he realises the family must flee. When the Germans intercept the party, Max persuades them that the family is on the way to the Festival. After giving a performance and winning the first prize, they slip out through the crypts behind the Abbey. Rolf, a Hitler Youth who was courting one of the Trapp girls, gives the alarm, but the Germans are thwarted when the nuns remove the distributor caps from their cars. The Captain, Maria and the children make their way over the mountains to a new life.

To say that this version of the stage success contains everything one would expect, should serve as sufficient warning to those allergic to singing nuns and sweetly innocent children. It is, in fact, an exceedingly sugary experience (though some would say less so than the original), full of good thoughts and religious feelings and as wholesome as the well-scrubbed face of its heroine, with her so beautiful articulation and pure singing tone. Even these ingredients might have been bearable if the songs had been better; alas, this is one of Rodgers and Hammerstein's less memorable scores (although the film tries to disprove this by repeating everything three or four times), and the plot's serious overtones - wicked Nazis, etc.- fit uneasily into the paper-thin fabric, especially when Robert Wise directs these scenes as if they came from some anonymous B feature. Being a big budget 70 mm. enterprise, the film partially comes into its own when it gets outdoors. Although the exteriors sometimes look like cuts from a Cinerama travelogue on Austria, the views of Salzburg and its environs are very eye-catching, especially the aerial shots at the beginning (photographed by Paul Beeson), culminating in a great downward sweep on to a hill as Miss Andrews appears, to fling herself into her first ditty. The introductions to the other songs are very awkwardly manoeuvred, and there is little to suggest that Wise will ever become a great musical director - the most one can say is that his handling is tactful and efficiently smooth. Faced with daunting opposition from nuns and children, the other players have a rather thankless task, although Eleanor Parker makes the most of her few acid lines; Christopher Plummer contrives to look unnaturally stiff and sinister, as if he were preparing to play Count Dracula; and Julie Andrews looks good enough to eat, but, this being The Sound of Music, she is spared that fate.

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