Review of Mutiny on the Bounty (1935) by Elliott F — 22 Jun 2010

Mutiny on the Bounty, while an engaging adventure story filled to the brim with good and evil, peril and paradise, suffers from a lack of historical accuracy that ultimately erodes the timelessness of the film itself and its alleged greatness. By most accounts, Bligh was not the villain as he is depicted here, and, by most accounts, Christian was not the hero, most likely staging the mutiny to prevent the end of a tropical Tahitian vacation filled with women, wine, and song. Knowing this most basic fact confuses the effectiveness of the tale, even if Laughton paints Bligh with the most hideous of unnecessarily evil motivations.

Though the film was released in 1935 and went on to earn the Best Picture Oscar, little details of the film's construction undercut the film's ability to transcend the decade in which it was produced. For example, it was glaringly jarring to watch Gable--handsome, handsome Clark Gable--play an English sailor without the faintest trace of an English accent. Though Gable performed his role well, infusing him with strong moral character, salty heroic strength, and swoon-worthy romance as Christian fawned over his native love interest, his performance was undermined by a lack of consideration for dialect, especially when surrounded by a bevy of native Englishmen, not the least of which includes Laughton himself. In addition, while it was impressive to incorporate on-location sets for both the seafaring Bounty and the Tahitian islands, some of the costuming and set decoration, perhaps given the limitations of the decade of production, were largely theatrical and less realistic and, therefore, less believable. Furthermore, while Laughton's Bligh was truly despicable, in the depiction of his most banal selfishness and outright abuses of his station, Laughton's performance was rendered somewhat of a caricature, owing to a permanently deadpan scowl, save for the occasional narrow-eyed sneer, and a clipped vocal delivery to delineate his most captain-like demeanor. If it weren't for the scenes showing Bligh's struggle to survive after being cast off by the mutineers, in which Laughton's true acting range was given a chance to lend the viewer a real ambiguous moment of sympathy with the film's villain, his performance, however Shakespearean in the magnitude of his character's villainy, would have readily and singlehandedly sunk the film.

These minor gripes are not meant to condemn the film entirely. On the whole, Mutiny on the Bounty was largely entertaining and a more than decent slice of entertainment. Aside from Gable's performance, Tone's Byam was also, in the vein of all good old movies, slightly melodramatic but convincing and organic. The story was, indeed, engaging, even if slightly inaccurate, though it took some time to get to the mutiny; however, the details were laid out in a way in which all motivations, including Bligh's, were clear and made sense within the framework of the story being portrayed. The set construction of eighteenth century ships was also extraordinary and served to emphasize the escapist/adventure element of the entertainment effectively.

All in all, Mutiny on the Bounty is an entertaining film, even if it should not be substituted for a history book (or even a Cliffs Notes version of one) if one is attempting to study the actual mutiny that occurred in the late eighteenth century. Also, to be fair, even if Clark Gable could not muster a convincing English accent, he managed to fill the role of Fletcher Christian so completely, suspension of disbelief eventually arrived, though it had to be earned, and one would probably have to be lost in the story first. To those who enjoy a good story set to a backdrop of vast ocean and high adventure, Mutiny on the Bounty may be just the ticket.