The Bounty
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Movie Reviews of The Bounty
Movie Review: The Bounty
Summary: 5 Stars
Great movie.Movie Review: Wonderful characterizations - especially Hopkins' Bligh
Summary: 4 Stars
This isn't a simple retelling of the story of the "Mutiny on the Bounty" with a vicious Captain Bligh and a troubled, but virtuous Mr. Christian saving the crew from unbearable cruelty. This is a much better story. The movie begins at the trial at the Admiralty of Lieutenant Bligh for losing the HMS Bounty. The movie flashes back to the story from this trial periodically. This device allows the movie to focus on key points in a story that takes place over well more than a year without having to try and keep a strict narrative together.
Bligh has been assigned to go to Tahiti to get Breadfruit plants and take them to Jamaica to provide cheaper feed for the slaves and while he is doing that he wants to circumnavigate the globe - a career-making move in 1787. Assigned to Bligh as first mate is John Fryer who is doubtful about going round the Horn off the southern tip of South America that is noted for its mighty storms. Bligh brings along his friend Fletcher Christian as the officer after John Fryer.
After they finally reach Tahiti and negotiate to get the breadfruit, they have to wait for them to grow. They are there many months longer than expected and the men get attached to the local women who are mostly bare breasted and very agreeable companions. Discipline breaks down.
Bligh remains above all the fraternization, but has a hard time pulling the crew back together and as they set sail for home he applies harsh discipline to get the crew back into fit condition and sets a course that upsets the men. Christian has his own resentments and torn loyalties, but does lead the crew in mutiny and sets Bligh adrift in a small open launch (it was only 23 foot long and 6 foot 9 inches wide). Bligh's courage and magnificent seamanship got them through the 3,618 nautical mile journey without loss of life in 47 days. The movie isn't quite accurate about the survival of all the crew.
Christian goes back to Tahiti but is forbidden to stay. The mutineers and some Tahitians end up on a then unknown island and their descendants live there to this day.
This movie was made in 1984 as a vehicle for Mel Gibson's charisma and blazing stardom. He is charismatic and has some good lines and does them well. His Christian is torn, but also self indulgent and sometimes petulant without much discipline. The star of this movie, and becomes more so each time I see it, is Anthony Hopkins playing Captain Bligh. He is wonderful in this role. His characterization is quite complex. His Bligh is a good man without charisma who tries to hold order with a discipline that becomes harsher as the men resist. In this movie there isn't a single villain with good guys, it is a confluence of flaws in all the characters that leads to the breakdown.
My favorite portion of the movie is in the open launch. I find those scenes particularly powerful.
My least favorite aspect of the movie is the musical score by Vangelis. He was a hot commodity in the early 1980's having done "Chariots of Fire" and "Blade Runner" (his most effective score). Here it gives a strange quality to a movie taking place in the 18th century. This is especially so since there are large portions of the movie without background music and when the synthesizers come in they are too noticeable. For me, and maybe not for you, but for me, it makes the movie sound too much like "Blade Runner". It is a small point, however. This is a very good movie.
Movie Review: The Bounty
Summary: 4 Stars
This movie is now over 25 years old, but it still has all the elements of a quality movie. Thre's good action, good drama, good scenery to go along with good acting and casting. Mel Gibson was still a relative newcomer on the movie scene when this film was made. He had achieved some recognition from the "Mad Max" films but in this role he played a real life character, Fletcher Christian. Anthony Hopkins brought the experience to the cast that brought out the solid performances from those who made up the "Bounty's" crew.
Straight-laced William Bligh commanded the "Bounty" on what was to be a circumnavigation of the globe to obtain breadfruit trees for Jamaica. Storms at Cape Horn forced the ship to divert to the south Pacific via the Indian Ocean. He alienated many of the crew with his discipline and insistence on order. Eventually the ship lands at Tahiti amid ceremony and native pageantry. The crew quickly begins to fraternize with native women which leads to further breakdowns in discipline.
Fletcher Christian, as Bligh's right hand man, emerges as the leader of those who seek to take control of the ship. This is perhaps the film's defining scene as Christian refuses to harm Bligh, but stands his ground when challenged by Bligh. Once in control of a mutinous crew, Christian has his hands full in finding safe haven away from the shipping lanes. He retains order, but many are presumably ready to mutiny again if land isn't discovered soon. As fate would have it, Bligh and those cast off in the life boat with him, find land and return to England. Bligh is put on trial where he is exonerated of any wrongdoing.
This movie gives a good account of the mutiny on the Bounty. With nothing but Bligh's log book as record it is difficult to recreate the events without some bias, but this film seems balanced in its approach. The mutineers eventually discover Pitcairn Island where their descendents live to this day. The film is well made with solid directing and acting. After 25 years, it remains the standard on this historical event.
Movie Review: Underrated retelling of the Bounty story
Summary: 4 Stars
This is the third major cinematic retelling of the story of the Bounty. The standard is still the 1935 version with Charles Laughton and Clark Gable, of course, but this most recent version has the advantage of color, and plenty of beautiful, topless Tahitian women. Speaking of which, this retelling places the major responsibility for the mutiny on the beautiful, topless Tahitian women. Hopkins portrays Captain Bligh as hard-nosed, but not cruel, and his disciplinary actions are depicted as well within the bounds of what was acceptable in those days. No keel hauling, no letting people die of thirst, no banishing people to the rigging during storms, etc. The problem is that Fletcher Christian has fallen in love with a Tahitian princess, who becomes pregnant with his child, and he is heartbroken about leaving her. Bligh is totally insensitive to his friend's predicament, and chooses that moment to start running a tight ship. Even so, Christian is conflicted about the mutiny. He seems to know he is doing the wrong thing, but can't help himself.
This may be a more balanced (and perhaps more historically accurate, I don't know) portrayal of the story, but it leaves you with no one to root for and no one to identify with. You feel bad for both men. You feel sorry for Christian, because it must have been gut-wrenching for him to have to leave his young Tahitian wife, but you can't really approve of the mutiny, either. On the other hand, you do not like Bligh, who is an insensitive, arrogant prick, but he has done nothing that even comes close to justifying taking the ship away from him.
On a technical note, the picture looks great, and the sound is unusually good for DVD. On the negative side, there are no extras whatsoever. I am chagrined to learn, from a previous reviewer, that there were two commentary tracks on the British version. The DVD is being sold inexpensively in America, but I bet most buyers would have gladly paid a little more to get the version with the commentary tracks and some decent extras.
Movie Review: Not Quite A David Lean Movie
Summary: 4 Stars
Mel Gibson is appealing and charismatic as Fletcher Christian. Much more so than the 1935 version, Donaldson's BOUNTY depicts the mutiny as a clash in values arising from Britain's hidebound class system, with Fletcher Christian the Cavalier and Captain Bligh the Roundhead, Christian the noble bohemian and Bligh the civil servant obnssesed with getting head in the world by hook or by crook, a man with a vision so small he can't see the big picture. In the 1935 version, you'd imagine that Clark Gable came from a lower class than Charles Laughton, but here it's all so clear. Casting Olivier as the one of the officers on the impugning admiralty panel was a stroke of genius (besides giving the movie that touch of class) in the way that he clearly cannot understand Hopkins' Uriah Heep-style singlemindedness.
David Lean wanted to make this movie in the late 1970s and he had the boat made to his specifications years before. Robert Bolt's script was originally written in two parts, THE LAWBREAKERS and THE LONG ARM OF THE LAW, and Lean spent four years trying to get Warner Brothers to back him properly. When Bolt had a stroke, Lean despaired of ever being allowed to make the picture he wanted to, and abandoned his sketches and went on to think about his alternative project, Forster's PASSAGE TO INDIA. In the meantime, severely cheaper director Roger Donaldson was given Bolt's script and asked to make a single picture from it.
He showed a Lean-like appreciation of nature vs. civilization, the photographer's eye, even a Lean-like casting sense, with early appearances by Liam Neeson and Daniel Day Lewis. Hopkins gives the picture its gravitas, Gibson its glamor. He is crazy good looking in this part, a true successor to Gable and Brando. Funny how he plays a fellow called "Christian" in this movie, and then got all Christian in real life! Be careful what you wish for.