bkoganbing I have to admit that I was not sure of what I would be seeing when I finally got a copy of In The Wake Of The Bounty. The Australian film is noted today for being the debut of Errol Flynn in motion pictures is mostly a fine documentary about the lives of the folks on rugged Pitcairn Island, the descendants of the Bounty mutineers and the women they took with them from Tahiti.When MGM did it's grand scale production of Mutiny on the Bounty in 1935, Louis B. Mayer bought all the rights to this film and it was never shown in America intact. Pieces of it were seen in short documentary subjects about Pitcairn Island.The producer/director/writer of In The Wake Of The Bounty was Charles Clauvel who some would credit with being the father of Australian cinema. He and his wife and baby girl took motion picture cameras and a crew to Pitcairn Island and put together a fine feature film documentary. And he had about 15 to 20 minutes of acting.It's a technique that Americans will be familiar with if they watch the History Channel. It calls for the use of some brief live action sequences interspersed with documentary footage and voice-over commentary about whatever event the program is talking about. This is the function of Errol Flynn and the small cast who reenact the Bounty mutiny in microcosm.Certainly Charles Clauvel did not have the facilities that Louis B. Mayer had so reviewers should go easy on this intrepid Australian who went out to a rarely seen part of the world. Instead of comparing In The Wake Of The Bounty to it's later and more known successors, it might better be compared to some of the documentaries of Frank Buck or Martin and Osa Johnson.To be sure the acting isn't of the best caliber, I've seen worse however. The film really didn't need the actors, it should have been much better as a straight documentary.On the other hand Errol Flynn might then have toiled in obscurity and who knows who would have played all those swashbuckling heroes at Warner Brothers.

briantaves As the second cinematic presentation of the 1789 mutiny aboard the Bounty–the first was also made in Australia in 1916–this film is required viewing for anyone interested in that historical chapter.A pre-credits crawl announces the documentary and travelogue endeavor, to follow in the Bounty's wake: promising this is the first of a series from Expeditionary Films that should also entertain. As the movie opens, there is singing in an old English tavern, and the initial impression is that this is not so different from the 1935 Frank Lloyd version. A crusty old sailor recalls for his fellows the strange incidents of that voyage, in a series of flashbacks, and the differences become apparent. There are no topside nautical scenes of the Bounty, just brief shots of sails interspersed with tight settings below decks, mostly among the grumbling, mistreated sailors, and a couple with Bligh and a mute Christian. Errol Flynn in his first film is barely recognizable in that role at this point.The setting shifts outdoors, as the Tahitians spot the Bounty in the distance, eagerly gathering their boats to go out and meet it. Ashore, they put on a dancing spectacle for the crew, who are drawn into romantic relationships with the natives while living on Tahiti when the Bounty is at anchor. However, after months of bliss, the crew must return to the ship, and depart for England, a placard promising death to those who may seek to desert.After a few weeks of the voyage home the mutiny erupts, at which point Christian takes command. He denounces Bligh's treatment of him and the crew, the starvation, insults, and lashings, and sets him adrift. Flynn gives his most notable monologue asking no one to follow him–but all are eager to do so. Back in the tavern, the sailor says that Bligh made the voyage back to civilization and two decades have now passed and none knows what has become of Christian and his followers. This leaves open the question of the sailor's own point-of-view and how his omniscience was acquired.Here the movie shifts from reconstruction of historical events to become the first motion picture event to document the mutineer's haven of Pitcairn Island. Three months were spent filming there by Hollywood-trained pioneer Australian director Charles Chauvel, his wife, and cameraman Tasman Higgins, with an additional two months in Tahiti. Most of the budget was spent on this portion, leaving little for the studio shooting at Cinesound in Bondi.This second half of the dual narrative strategy is vastly more successful than the first and gives IN THE WAKE OF THE BOUNTY its timeless quality. Beginning at Tahiti, its thriving commerce and tourist aspects of the day contrast with the reception that had greeted the arrival of the Bounty, shown earlier.The expedition departs for Pitcairn Island and there finds a thriving community of fifty families. While acknowledging the bloodletting of its initial years, the aptly-named John Adams, final surviving crewman of the Bounty, took up the Bible and by his ministry created a paradise. Life is simple and agricultural, the rugged terrain supplying needs and providing the residents with a landscape photographed so as to make the viewer see Pitcairn as a new Eden. The black-and-white photography both captures the natural beauty as well as conveying the sense of a time gone by. The production of IN THE WAKE OF THE BOUNTY, particularly on Pitcairn Island, was related in a book by the director published to coincide with the movie's release, In the Wake of the Bounty--To Tahiti and Pitcairn Island (Sydney: Endeavour Press).On Pitcairn, the devout people are devoted to one another, sharing all they have equally, everyone contributing their labor, demonstrating the viability of socialism on this island. With the mix of races, and despite the inbreeding, the residents are strong and healthy, even when one individual with the Christian surname marries another. Indeed, one of the Christian descendants is described as the "Beau Brummel" of Pitcairn.Yet while there are eager visitors to this nearly inaccessible spot, with a harbor that only the trained inhabitants can navigate, there are drawbacks. In the final sequence, one of the resident's first-born is near death, and in need of a physician. A passing freighter with a doctor on board, unwilling to detour from its own course, ignores their distress signal.This startling, harsh conclusion separates the movie from other South Seas documentaries of the time. An island idyll comes at a price. The second half, with only one very brief coda of another flashback of Christian and another mutineer on the island, becomes a time capsule of an apparent paradise lost; today the island has fewer than 50 inhabitants.IN THE WAKE OF THE BOUNTY fulfills its purpose of discovering the outcome of that fateful action so long ago. Although it faced censorship over both the depiction of floggings aboard the Bounty and Tahitian women in indigenous garb, the movie was finally given educational endorsement upon its Australian release (one of seven feature-length movies made in the country in 1933). It serves as an ideal companion piece to other filmic presentations of the Bounty saga, which have either so lightly touched upon the Pitcairn portion or outrageously misrepresented its history, most notably in the shallow renditions of 1962 and 1984. The fact that IN THE WAKE OF THE BOUNTY carries forth its story to the final outcome for the mutineers was recognized by MGM when releasing its 1935 spectacular, when the studio bought the rights and used some footage in the 1935 promotional shorts PRIMITIVE PITCAIRN and PITCAIRN ISLAND TODAY. IN THE WAKE OF THE BOUNTY is distinct from other representations, a fitting monument to a historical incident and an enduring legend.

classicsoncall I found the film to be strangely surreal, relating as it does the life on Pitcairn Island for the descendants of Fletcher Christian and his fellow mutineers from the 'Bounty'. After setting Captain Bligh and eighteen of his men adrift in the ocean, Christian and his crew found solace and a life on Pitcairn, seemingly welcomed by the native inhabitants with which they formed an ongoing community. Virtually invisible to ocean going steamers as late as the 1930's, one hundred sixty years of inbreeding among the island's inhabitants is presented as a virtual idyllic utopia.Told in a documentary style with inserted dramatizations of the mutiny, it appears the picture was put together as sort of a travelogue by Expeditionary Films, whose stated goal at the beginning of the story was to take the viewer to strange and exotic places. In that respect it seems to succeed, and I imagine viewers of the time might have marveled at it's story. By the same token, it leaves out large chunks of the Bounty's history, thereby blurring the distinctions between fiction and fact.Going in, I was intrigued by this being Errol Flynn's first movie role. In fact, his first appearance on screen is almost comical, somewhat in a 'Saturday Night Live' kind of way. His role thankfully is presented in the limited flashback scenarios that paint a picture of the mutiny and the angst he experienced as a result. For those interested in swordplay, you might better sit this one out.Considering the film was made in 1933 I was rather impressed with Charles Chauvel's direction and story of this South Seas tale. It's wondrous and weird at the same time and will likely make you thankful for your present circumstances. For anyone wondering what it might be like to live on a secluded tropical island, this is quite the eye opener.

vladimir-137 This film combines documentary, travelogue-style footage with dramatic 'reconstructions' of the mutiny on the Bounty.Much of it is silent, ie with music only, as I recall. It's very much a primitive sound-movie, in which the director is still working with silent movie techniques, although not in any sophisticated way.The acting in the dramatic scenes is uniformly abysmal; very 'stagey' acting even by the more experienced performers. The only interest is in seeing Errol Flynn in his first movie role. He's dreadful: very wooden delivery; as stiff as a parody of amateur theatricals, with no star presence whatsoever.But I find it of interest for this very reason. It shows that even a superstar like Errol Flynn didn't hatch from the egg fully formed, and that however bad you are to start with, there's still hope ...