it's strange how Hollywood is responsible for so much bad history being foisted upon the common knowledge of humanity . The Battle Of Little Big Horn is perceived to have been a glorious defeat for the 7th Calvary and where George A Custer was the last soldier to die . The defeat of that unit was anything but glorious for the regiment who put up a very poor fight while there's no evidence that Custer died as the last man standing . Modern perception of historical events is full of factual mistakes that can be laid firmly at the door of Hollywood
The mutiny on The Bounty is another example of Hollywood revisionist history . Since so many people have seen some tyrant being cruel to the noble Errol Flynn , Clark Gable or Marlon Brando it enters their mind that it must be somehow true . What I loved about this version is that it's very much accurate where the known facts are concerned . Captain Bligh might have been an authoritarian but there's no way he could in the context of the time be described as a cruel tyrant . On British naval ships at the time the Captain's word was the word of god but unlike the British army at the time where more often than not officers bought their rank the Royal Navy was a meritocracy where Captain's started at the very bottom of the ladder and worked their way up , bumbling fools didn't get very far in this service . It's also interesting to note that Bligh had a trio of deserters flogged rather than hanged , an act of compassion that contributes to his downfall . The film doesn't go into great detail about the fate of the mutineers but it insinuates that they eventually ended up murdering one another on Pitcairn leaving just one survivor . Like thieves there's no honour amongst mutineers which history like this film should judge as being in the wrong
THE BOUNTY is a beautiful film experience . I watched it on a widescreen TV via DVD and if David Lean had directed this he could not have done a better job than Roger Donaldson has . You can almost feel the sunlight touch you thanks to Arthur Ibbetsen's cinematography and it's impossible not to mention the then mainly unknown cast . With the exception of Olivier , Fox and Gibson probably the most well known actor to a 1984 audience would be Bernard Hill who had won a BAFTA the previous year for BOYS FROM THE BLACKSTUFF , it's amazing to think at this time very few people had heard of Liam Neeson or Daniel Day Lewis . Some people might have heard of Anthony Hopkins but only if they'd seen MAGIC and A BRIDGE TOO FAR and had a very good memory for faces . Hopkins gives a great and sympathetic performance , one of the best of his career in fact
There's not too much to criticise about THE BOUNTY . I did feel that Vangelis electronic soundtrack didn't really go with the visuals , and the interior of the ship seemed just a little too clean to be convincing while I would have liked to have seen the journey of the marooned Bligh and his loyalists ( A journey so amazing that if a fiction writer wrote it no one would have believed it ) in a little more detail but these are very minor criticisms and this is a very good historical adventure film
The mutiny on The Bounty is another example of Hollywood revisionist history . Since so many people have seen some tyrant being cruel to the noble Errol Flynn , Clark Gable or Marlon Brando it enters their mind that it must be somehow true . What I loved about this version is that it's very much accurate where the known facts are concerned . Captain Bligh might have been an authoritarian but there's no way he could in the context of the time be described as a cruel tyrant . On British naval ships at the time the Captain's word was the word of god but unlike the British army at the time where more often than not officers bought their rank the Royal Navy was a meritocracy where Captain's started at the very bottom of the ladder and worked their way up , bumbling fools didn't get very far in this service . It's also interesting to note that Bligh had a trio of deserters flogged rather than hanged , an act of compassion that contributes to his downfall . The film doesn't go into great detail about the fate of the mutineers but it insinuates that they eventually ended up murdering one another on Pitcairn leaving just one survivor . Like thieves there's no honour amongst mutineers which history like this film should judge as being in the wrong
THE BOUNTY is a beautiful film experience . I watched it on a widescreen TV via DVD and if David Lean had directed this he could not have done a better job than Roger Donaldson has . You can almost feel the sunlight touch you thanks to Arthur Ibbetsen's cinematography and it's impossible not to mention the then mainly unknown cast . With the exception of Olivier , Fox and Gibson probably the most well known actor to a 1984 audience would be Bernard Hill who had won a BAFTA the previous year for BOYS FROM THE BLACKSTUFF , it's amazing to think at this time very few people had heard of Liam Neeson or Daniel Day Lewis . Some people might have heard of Anthony Hopkins but only if they'd seen MAGIC and A BRIDGE TOO FAR and had a very good memory for faces . Hopkins gives a great and sympathetic performance , one of the best of his career in fact
There's not too much to criticise about THE BOUNTY . I did feel that Vangelis electronic soundtrack didn't really go with the visuals , and the interior of the ship seemed just a little too clean to be convincing while I would have liked to have seen the journey of the marooned Bligh and his loyalists ( A journey so amazing that if a fiction writer wrote it no one would have believed it ) in a little more detail but these are very minor criticisms and this is a very good historical adventure film