Victory
by Mark Peploe
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Irene Jacob, Rufus Sewell, Sam Neill, Willem DafoeDirector: Mark Peploe
Brand: Buena Vista Home Video
Producer: Yves Attal
Producer: Chris Auty
Producer: Simon Bosanquet
Producer: Jeremy Thomas
Producer: Bob Weinstein
Producer: Harvey Weinstein
Producer: Ingrid Windisch
Writer: Joseph Conrad (novel)
Writer: Mark Peploe (screenplay)
Writer: Frederick Seidel (screenplay)
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround; English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround
Format: NTSC
Picture Format: 2.35:1
Running Time: 99 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2012-01-06
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Lionsgate
Movie Reviews of Victory
Movie Review: An Intelligent Adaptation
Summary: 5 Stars
Victory (the novel) is hardly one of Conrad's masterpieces, and is his most melodramatic piece of fiction. These melodramatic elements lend themselves very well, however, when it comes to translating Conrad to film (which hasn't been done very well to this stage, apart from Coppola's loose adaptation of Heart of Darkness, Apocalypse Now). Director Mark Peploe, a sometime collaborator with Bernardo Bertolluci, has fashioned a script that comes close to the spirit of Conrad's novel. The changes that have been made have to do with the book's ending, yet they don't hinder the artistic flow of the film in any manner. The story is a classic good vs. evil allegory, with Heyst (Willem Dafoe) representing a fallen Adam trying to make his way back to paradise. Just for reinforcement of the concept, Heyst's father stares down in glaring disapproval from a painting Heyst has had delivered from his old digs in San Francisco. He's now living in a paradisical setting (the Javanese vistas the camera captures are beautiful indeed), yet is living in isolation. His loneliness is cured when he rescues a young, French violinist playing in a travelling all-female orchestra which is performing at Herr Schomberg's hotel. Schomberg, who hates Heyst, is in the process of purchasing Lena (who we learn is actually named Alma) from San Giacimo, the oily impresario who conducts the orchestra and who, along with his iron-fisted wife, has absolute control over the female orchestra members.
After Heyst has rescued Alma and hidden her away on his island retreat, Schomberg receives a trio of unwelcome guests at his hotel. These are the Satanic duo of the mysterious Mr. Jones and his "secretary," Ricardo. A swarthy henchman named Pedro also acts a criminal aide-de-camp to Ricardo. In order to get rid of the trio and to exact his revenge on Heyst, Schomberg tells them that Heyst has swindled a former partner and had him killed, and that he then cashed in a huge insurance policy, the proceeds of which Heyst has secreted away somewhere on his island.
In the meantime, Heyst, who had been a reluctant benfactor at first, has fallen in love with Alma, who appears to have fallen for him as well. Suddenly, the trio appear at Heyst's dock in an open boat, and they look to have suffered from water deprivation and exposure. Heyst is suspicious of them from the outset, but acts the samaritan and gives them food, drink and shelter. Plot description beyond this stage would involve spoilers.
This movie is extremely well directed and well cast. Dafoe fits the bill for the Conradian westerner isolating himself in the far east. Sam Neil captures the "please allow me to introduce myself" quality of Jones and Sewell is a perfect Ricardo. Irene Jacob, who slept-walked like Lady Macbeth in her role of Desdemona in the 1995 Othello, is a convincing Alma. Ho Yi, Simon Callow, and Jean Yanne as Schomberg round out an excellent ensemble. Yet the major credit goes to Peploe for an intelligent script and assured direction. It's not easy adapting psychological novelists to the screen, which is why there are so few efforts at it. Nostromo, Conrad's masterpiece, for instance, reads almost like cinema, yet it hasn't been atttempted in a screen version, save for a rather weak BBC television adaptation. The Peter O'Toole Lord Jim was nothing like the novel. This neglected version of Victory may not be perfect, but it's as close as a filmmaker has come thus far.
BEK
Summary of Victory
Starring Willem Dafoe (Spider-Man, Shadow Of The Vampire) and Sam Neill (Jurassic Park, The Horse Wisperer), Victory is an intense story of a man accused of murder and his struggle to keep himself and the woman he loves alive! In a remote Dutch East Indies seaport, Axel Heyst (Dafoe) lives in a prominent hotel. Al all-women orchestra plays in the hotel each night and the orchestra owner agrees to "sell" one of the girls, Alma (Irene Jacob - U.S. Marshals), to the sinister owner of the hotel. When Alma begs Heyst to save her from a life of prostitiution, they escape to a tropic island...but not before Heyst is accused of murder! Also starring Rufus Sewell (A Knights Tale) - the suspense intensifies as the hotel owner points a bloodthirsty gang of bandits to the island, telling them their lost furtune lies hidden there!This product is manufactured on demand using DVD-R recordable media. Amazon.com's standard return policy will apply.
Filmed in 1995 and marginally released in Europe in 1998, Victory deserves a better life on video. Adapted by director Mark Peploe from Joseph Conrad's 1915 novel Victory: An Island Tale, this exotic melodrama takes place in the Dutch East Indies in 1913 and '14, where the reclusive Mr. Heyst (Willem Dafoe) lives alone on the secluded island where he once operated a coal mine. Rumored to have killed his business partner, Heyst makes a rare trip to a nearby island, rescues a beautiful violinist named Alma (Irčne Jacob) from a wretched hotelier, and returns home with reward-seeking killers (Sam Neill, Rufus Sewell) in close pursuit. A misanthropic pacifist, Heyst faces a dual dilemma: he's fallen in love and must protect Alma at all costs. Preserving Conrad's literary elegance, Peploe opts for a simmering escalation of tension, with a conclusion that Miramax deemed too downbeat for U.S. audiences. Boasting fine performances and breathtaking locations, this gripping film is ripe for rediscovery. --Jeff Shannon
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