Ship of Fools
|
Our Price: $72.89 Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Buy Used: from $36.77 (click here) Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Buy this DVD movie at online store in your country
Canada
Canada
Movie Reviews of Ship of Fools
Movie Review: 2.5 stars out of 4
Summary: 3 Stars
The Bottom Line:
Ship of Fools tells the story of various passengers on an ocean liner heading for pre-WWII Nazi Germany by unwisely ignoring the more interesting sociopolitical themes in order to focus on the more leaden soap opera type interactions between the passengers; something of a forerunner to Irwin Allen's later blockbusters in this regard (though without a disaster) it's not a film to make time for.
Movie Review: A real klunker: over-obvious and overlong
Summary: 2 Stars
A socially conscious would-be epic, from back in the days When Art Mattered. The story takes place on a German ocean liner in the early 1930s, traveling from Mexico back to Der Fatherland, with an all-star cast of Spaniards, Americans, Jews, drunks, dwarves, exiles, tortured artists and Germans -- both good and bad -- all sailing towards their date with Destiny. Honestly, I could only force myself to watch about two-thirds of the way through, and then I had to admit I was stone cold bored, and besides, the rental was already one day overdue and it was getting close to closing time. This isn't a bad movie, but its earnest, over-serious style of presentation felt very dated, and I could see where the plot was headed from a mile away. Some fine character actors, but kind of a lumpy, klunky script. (Axton)Movie Review: Lengthy soap opera overshadows social commentary
Summary: 2 Stars
This movie starts out as an ensemble drama examining the racial, religous and class prejudices onboard a cruise ship bound for a newly-Nazified Germany in 1933. Unfortunately, it turns into a wordy mess of a soap opera, that focuses far too much attention on the unsympathetic, frankly pathetic characters played by George Segal and Elizabeth Ashley. By the end of the two and a half hours, I was hoping one would throw the other overboard!
In the documentary included with the version in the Stanley Kramer box set, Ashley says that Ship of Fools is the best movie of her career...what does that say about her career?
Movie Review: Very dull
Summary: 2 Stars
Exceedingly long, fairly slow, retread topics about rascism. A bunch of different types on a boat, an allegory for the world in the 1930s, foreshadoing the clash of WWII and other events to come. A lot of droning talk about Jews. Very slow and long movie. Emphasis on trite discussions about social classes. Obnoxious Germans. Dull diner table discussions on the cruise ship. Vivien Leigh gave a nice performance. A Jew and a midget assess the situations.Movie Review: Ship of Fools, and One Smart Short Guy
Summary: 1 Stars
The people who gave this movie one star because it'sa presented in full-screen and not in its original aspect ratio have to remember one thing ... there's midget in this movie, the great (albeit diminutive) Michael Dunn.
Give this guy a break. Full-screen makes him that much taller. In fact, why stop there, why not have a special version of this movie where Michael Dunn is normal-size and everyone else is a dwarf.
I'd pay a few bucks to see that ... mister.
As for the movie, ahhh, what can I say. You want my opinion? You insist? I mean, other than the ratio-break we should give the short guy. ... Ahhh, what can I say: the movie's kind of "over the top," no? (And now the Oscar for Worst Over-acting in a Movie -- the entire cast of "Ship of Fools"!)
I liked the part where the "artiste" jumped overboard to save a dog. Why? Because his particular art was doing wood carvings of animals. So, get it? -- an animal, a dog, jumps overboard and he jumps in after it. And croaks, drowns. Meaning that, logically speaking, if someone threw Michael Dun overboard unless someone had done a wood carving of midgets, there'd be no one to save the little cocker.
(God, I hate logic!)
Also, how sad to see the *great* Vivian Leigh in such a nothing part. I loved that gal every since Clark Gable cursed her out in "Gone With the Wind." Or was it "Gone WIth the Wind Chill Factor"? ... One of them was on the Discovery Channel, I know that.
Then there's Lee Marvin -- who, seated, is greeted by Vivien Leigh with the line: "Don't bother to get up." Which, as we all know, is Blanche's line from "Streetcar Named Desire" ("Don't bother to get up, I'm just passing through.") I got a big kick out of that. In fact, I think "Ship of Fools" would have been a much better movie if the entire script was transferred verbatim from "Streetcar Named Desire."
I will conclude my review with a brief comment on the flamingo dancers in "Ship of Fools." ... ENOUGH ALREADY! ... All that tapping and stomping, and banging and spritzing. They gave me *such* a headache, you wouldn't believe.
Anyway, everybody on the ship was a fool. Not one smarty-pants in the crowd. And this isn't maybe a little cynical on the part of the genius-author, Katherine Anne Porter, and the genius-director, Stanley Kramer? In other words, everyone else is a dope and they're a couple of goens. This I find hard to believe. What about Michael Dunn. Sharp as a tack! And I mean that. From the bottom.