This is a powerful and well done film and I highly recommend it.
The opening of this film has a real sense of mystery. There are sailors being shanghaied, a wonted woman, and dense fog in SanFrancisco. There's a dandy shipwreck scene, and then "The Ghost" ship appears picking up two survivors -- Ida Lupino and Alexander Knox. It's the same ship John Garfield has signed up for to (it appears) get away from the law. The captain is Edward G. Robinson, who makes Captain Queeg look like a nursery rhyme character! And yet, it turns out that he is rather multidimensional -- somewhat of an intellectual.
I've always enjoyed Edward G. Robinson, although I tired of his many gangster roles. So this is a welcome change, and one of his finest roles.
Never a particular favorite of mine, Gene Lockhart is very good as the usually drunk ship's doctor. And another non-favorite of mine -- Barry Fitzgerald -- is good, and thank god, not as a priest! Though they received up-front billing, Ida Lupino and John Garfield's parts are clearly inferior to those of Robinson and Knox, although their importance to the film increases during the second half of the film....although the latter part of the film is less interesting than the first half.
There are a lot of intriguing aspects to this far-better-than-average seafaring adventure.
The opening of this film has a real sense of mystery. There are sailors being shanghaied, a wonted woman, and dense fog in SanFrancisco. There's a dandy shipwreck scene, and then "The Ghost" ship appears picking up two survivors -- Ida Lupino and Alexander Knox. It's the same ship John Garfield has signed up for to (it appears) get away from the law. The captain is Edward G. Robinson, who makes Captain Queeg look like a nursery rhyme character! And yet, it turns out that he is rather multidimensional -- somewhat of an intellectual.
I've always enjoyed Edward G. Robinson, although I tired of his many gangster roles. So this is a welcome change, and one of his finest roles.
Never a particular favorite of mine, Gene Lockhart is very good as the usually drunk ship's doctor. And another non-favorite of mine -- Barry Fitzgerald -- is good, and thank god, not as a priest! Though they received up-front billing, Ida Lupino and John Garfield's parts are clearly inferior to those of Robinson and Knox, although their importance to the film increases during the second half of the film....although the latter part of the film is less interesting than the first half.
There are a lot of intriguing aspects to this far-better-than-average seafaring adventure.