☆ ☆ ☆ ½
Captains
Courageous (1937) – V. Fleming
Freddie Bartholomew is a spoiled little
shit and the movie is insufferable for its first 30 or 40 minutes as we see his
annoying antics at boarding school. The
point, of course, is to set up the fact that he has been neglected by his
father and that he really needs a good whupping by life. So, when he falls off a cruise ship and is
rescued by a fishing boat out of Gloucester, Mass., he is in for some growing
up. Enter Spencer Tracy as a
happy-go-lucky fisherman with a really bad faux-Portuguese accent. Over the course of 3 months at sea, Tracy and
Bartholomew form a bond (welcome the father figure-elect). The scenes at sea (filmed in the studio
“tank”) do create a realistic world of their own with no small thanks to Lionel
Barrymore and John Carradine. Naturally,
things prove awkward (and almost cringeworthy) when the voyage ends and
Bartholomew haltingly returns to his tycoon father (Melvyn Douglas). But
maturity has set in and a happy ending (of sorts) can’t be too far off.
Ultimately, Kipling’s story could have been made into a successful ripping yarn
for boys, but this version makes too many missteps in its retelling (for me) to
fully deserve its classic status.
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