brogmiller

In his home country Jean-Charles Tacchella is considered a capable director who is adept at blending tenderness and humour within a facile texture and this charming and polished piece is no exception.

This gentle satire on bourgeois hypocrisy is played to perfection by Victor Lanoux, Marie-Christine Barrault, Guy Marchand and Marie-France Pisier, an artiste for whom this viewer has always had a soft spot.

This is the kind of film that is customarily referred to by critics as being 'very French' but its undeniably feelgood factor very much appealed to North American audiences. Oscar nominated in three categories it came away empty-handed but on home turf picked up the coveted Prix Louis Delluc. It remains this director's sole international success.

The obligatory Hollywood rehash came out in 1989.

For this viewer at any rate the four words guaranteed to make me dash for the exit are: 'Sir Lew Grade Presents'. Despite its starry cast and by the standards of the time a hefty budget this retains alas the look and feel of a TV movie.

This tragic tale is one that needed to be told but the commercial gimmick of using a multitude of international names, some of whom have utterly needless roles, not to mention the mishmash of accents, has if anything diluted the dramatic impact, proof of which is it's lamentable showing at the box-office. There are compensations however in the performances, amongst others, of Max von Sydow, Lee Grant, José Ferrer, Katharine Ross(never better) and the brilliant Oskar Werner in sadly his last role.

It has been filmed in the style of a disaster movie but of course the real disaster is that the hapless passengers on board the MS St. Louis were victims of Goebbel's diabolical propoganda exercise to prove to the world that Jews were not refugees but pariahs about whose fate nobody cared. In refusing them entry based on 'immigration quotas', the so-called democracies of America and Canada simply became his accomplices.

One never ceases to be amazed at how wide film-makers spread the net in order to find material and director Andrew L. Stone has loosely, very loosely based his screenplay upon a mutiny that took place in 1905.

This is one of two films he made with James Mason in both of which his character has to contend with a psychopath. In 'Cry Terror' he is up against Rod Steiger and in this the honour goes to Broderick Crawford at his most brilliantly brutish.

Stone is probably most renowned for sinking the already condemned luxury liner SS Ile de France in 'The Last Voyage' and here he has utilised a Liberty ship, making the most of the confined spaces below decks to emphasise the aura of menace whilst Testosterone levels are increased by the presence of the cook's wife played by sultry Dorothy Dandridge whose character progresses from eye candy to avenging angel.

The editing by Stone's wife Virginia keeps the momentum going and is especially effective during the action packed second half which maintains one's interest despite highly improbable goings-on that strain credibility to the utmost.

The character of Edwin Rummell, sounds suspiciously like Erwin Rommel to me which may or may not be coincidental, gives James Mason an unfamiliar role as an action hero and it was Stone himself who commented that Mason 'was too intelligent for some of the work he had to do in movies.' Quite.