{"id":16063,"date":"2017-05-22T14:28:28","date_gmt":"2017-05-22T18:28:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=16063"},"modified":"2017-05-22T22:53:39","modified_gmt":"2017-05-23T02:53:39","slug":"br-moby-dick-1956","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=16063","title":{"rendered":"BR: Moby Dick (1956)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Film<\/strong>:\u00a0Excellent<\/p>\n

Transfer<\/strong>: Excellent<\/p>\n

Extras<\/strong>: Excellent<\/p>\n

Label:\u00a0<\/strong>\u00a0Twilight Time<\/p>\n

Region:<\/strong>\u00a0All<\/p>\n

Released:<\/strong>\u00a0November 15, 2016<\/p>\n

Genre:<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0Drama \/ Adventure<\/p>\n

Synopsis:<\/strong>\u00a0Robust, grim adaptation of Herman Melville’s novel in which mad Capt. Ahab marshals his crew to hunt the white whale that claimed his leg.<\/p>\n

Special Features:<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span>Audio commentary by film historians Julie Kirgo, Paul Seydor, and Nick Redman \/ Isolated Mono Music Track \/ Restoration Featurette: \u201cA Bleached Whale \u2013 Recreating the Unique Color of Moby Dick\u201d (5:40) \/ Posters, Lobby cards and Production Stills Gallery \/ Theatrical Trailer \/ 8-page colour booklet with liner notes by film historian Julie Kirgo \/ Limited to 3000 copies \/ Available exclusively from Screen Archives Entertainment<\/a> and www.twilighttimemovies.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Review:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Reportedly shot in 1954 and released two years later after a tumultuous production history, John Huston\u2019s film of Herman Melville\u2019s classic 1851 novel may have been poo-pooed by critics, with great disapproval levied on Gregory Peck, but time has been very kind to the film, aging into a beautifully dour, crazily exciting drama that boasts one of Peck\u2019s best screen performances as a villain, and Orson Welles\u2019 own fine moment \u2013 a cameo as Father Mapple that stops the film cold with a powerful sermon before the sailors head off to sea in search of whales.<\/p>\n

The reason for the film\u2019s fine aging stems from what historian Julie Kirgo sees as a perfect representation of Huston as a boundary breaking filmmaker: shooting on location, using practical sets and effects, playing with colour film processing, selecting powerful angles to emphasize tension, conflict, and mounting madness of characters; selecting a classical film composer to score his one and only film, and choreographing sequences in a kinetic style that makes this 1956 production oddly modern.<\/p>\n

Melville\u2019s tale of a young, wide-eyed adventurer joining\u00a0a commercial whaling hunt\u00a0and being almost swallowed whole\u00a0by a captain’s\u00a0mad quest to kill the beast that scarred his face and claimed his leg may have seemed like box office poison to studios and the film\u2019s eventual backers, but as a drama that traces the effects of obsession on a trapped, loyal crew, this is a magnificent endeavour.<\/p>\n

Peck may have been criticized as being too young and cast against his likable screen persona, but his Captain Ahab snarls, glowers, grinds his teeth, and with massive mouthfuls of prose cribbed and crafted by Huston and newcomer Ray Bradbury, his madness becomes almost eloquent, especially in a beautifully paced monologue in which would-be assassin Starbuck (superb Leo Genn) is poised to raise a pistol and end the crew\u2019s looming nightmare, but loses his will under\u00a0Ahab\u2019s tempered magnetism.<\/p>\n

Ahab bears similar traits to modern day cult leaders, offering them a better future through team work, sacrifice for the good of a common noble goal, using peer pressure to isolate rebels, and ultimately convince fence sitters to join in on the mad quest.<\/p>\n

As green-eared Ishmael, Richard Basehart (Titanic<\/a><\/strong>, The Satan Bug<\/a><\/strong>) is too old (the actor was 2 years older<\/em> than Peck!) but Basehart manages to sell the lad\u2019s naivete through voice and an energetic physical performance, and his deepening friendship with gloomy, doomed headhunter Queequeg, played bizarrely, yet memorably, by Austrian thespian Friederich von Ledebur (who would also appear in Huston\u2019s The Roots of Heaven<\/strong> and John Guillermin\u2019s The Blue Max<\/a><\/strong>).<\/p>\n

The main cast is surrounded by fine British character actors, including the great Harry Andrews as first mate Stubb, Bernard Miles (Great Expectations<\/strong>, The Man Who Knew Too Much<\/strong>) as the pliable Manxman, and Royal Dano (Something Wicked This Way Comes<\/strong>) in a scene-stealing moment in which he foretells the doom that will claim\u00a0all but one from\u00a0Ahab\u2019s suicide mission.<\/p>\n

Huston\u2019s film isn\u2019t all negativity: the ship\u2019s sailing from port is a visually and sonically rhythmic montage that\u2019s on par with the equally exciting maiden voyage of The HMS Bounty in Mutiny on the Bounty<\/a><\/strong> (1935), as are the whale chases (integrating a real hunt by a Portuguese team), the boiling down of blubber in revolting detail, and a sea storm that almost sends the crew to the ocean\u2019s bottom.<\/p>\n

The optimism and energy of his team is soon contrasted by Ahab\u2019s twitchy decision\u00a0to change course and dump a profitable catch for a suicide mission to kill a single creature, and when the men encounter Moby Dick, the excellent models (for its time) convey a nemesis whose bulk is as vicious and obsessive as Ahab.\u00a0James Robertson Justice (who co-starred with Peck in Captain Horatio Hornblower <\/strong>and David and Bathsheba<\/strong>) plays Capt. Boomer, who pushes himself on his own mad pursuit of Ahab when the latter refuses to help search for his missing son, and that cruelty is punctuated by Ahab’s final, grisly yet poetic fate.<\/p>\n

As Twilight Time\u2019s commentators \u2013 Kirgo, producer Nick Redman, and fellow historian Paul Seydor \u2013 detail in the exhaustive discussion, Welles and cinematographer Oswald Morris (Moulin Rouge<\/strong>, Our Man in Havana<\/a><\/strong>,The Dark Crystal<\/strong>) devised a scheme to shoot the movie full frame, but strike special widescreen prints in which the colour was desaturated to resemble period folk paintings, but all home video editions \u2013 tape, and the first DVD from MGM \u2013 were full frame transfers with boosted colour.<\/p>\n

KINO\u2019s 2015 DVD and TT\u2019s 2016 Blu sport the same 1.66:1 aspect ratio preferred by Huston, but it\u2019s TT\u2019s disc that offers the new restoration in which archival prints were used as reference points to create a faithful colour reproduction of the original 1.66:1 release prints. It does take a bit of time to acclimatize, but the look adds to the film\u2019s bleakness and manic anti-hero Ahab, whom we want to see fight the whale regardless of what it entails for his crew; poor souls motivated by Spanish coin nailed to a mast.<\/p>\n

Morris\u2019 cinematographic team included Freddie Francis (The Innocents<\/strong>, The Elephant Man<\/strong>) for second unit and Arthur Ibbetson (Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory<\/strong>, The Bounty<\/a><\/strong>) as camera operator, and reportedly folded into the crew were uncredited Kevin McClory (co-author of Thunderball<\/strong>) and Jack Clayton (The Innocents<\/strong>, and future director of Bradbury\u2019s Something Wicked This Way Comes<\/strong>).<\/p>\n

TT\u2019s disc sports a fine transfer, although adding to the film\u2019s unique colour scheme and Huston\u2019s sometimes steep compositions is what seems like a faster shutter speed, especially in the film\u2019s early scenes in the tavern with Ishmael. (This oddness is also present in the KINO DVD, which sports a similarly subdued colour palette.)<\/p>\n

Editor Russell Lloyd may be a classic unsung hero of modern montage, having cut many of Huston\u2019s films, including the taut car chases in the director\u2019s equally grim espionage thriller The MacKintosh Man<\/a><\/strong> (1973). Lloyd\u2019s later films weren\u2019t as memorable \u2013 The Lady Vanishes<\/strong> (1979), uncredited work on Caligula<\/strong> (1979), and the epic dud Absolute Beginners<\/a><\/strong> (1986), but is work with Huston deserves study.<\/p>\n

Huston would similarly call upon Welles for another small role, again stealing scenes from the cast as the rotund, tabloid \u2018journalist\u2019 in The Roots of Heaven<\/a> <\/strong>(1958).<\/p>\n

Critics may have felt Peck unsuitable for villains, but they missed the actors skill in transcending makeup, prosthetics, and wardrobe. Peck\u2019s fine as the much older madman, and a good 20 years later he would deliver a deliciously evil performance as scumbag Dr. Joseph Mengele in Ira Levin\u2019s Nazi sleazefest,\u00a0The Boys from Brazil<\/strong> (1978), a majestic bowl of rotting fruit. It\u2019s perhaps fitting that Peck\u2019s final role was as Father Mapple in Franc Roddam\u2019s 3 hour 1998 TV version of Melville\u2019s tale.<\/p>\n

In addition to TT\u2019s excellent commentary track, Sainton\u2019s score has been isolated in mono on a separate track with a few source cues, and restorationist Greg Kimble narrates a featurette on the film\u2019s look which is eloquently set to a more recent stereo re-recording of the score\u2019s main themes. (More info on the 8 month restoration is detailed at Twilight Time\u2019s main site<\/a>.) A stills gallery is packed with examples of the film’s original and 1976 reissue art.<\/p>\n

Many of Herman Melville\u2019s works have been adapted for the small and big screen, with Moby Dick<\/strong> adapted for TV around the world in 1954, 1972, 1977, 1998, 2005, and 2007, and on film in 1926, 1930, 1956, 1978, 2000, and 2013 (so far).<\/p>\n

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\u00a9 2017 Mark R. Hasan<\/p>\n

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External References:<\/strong>
\nEditor’s Blog<\/a> — IMDB<\/a> \u00a0— \u00a0Soundtrack Album<\/a> —\u00a0Composer Filmography<\/a>
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\nVendor Search Links:<\/strong>
\nAmazon.ca<\/a>\"\" \"\" —\u00a0<\/span> Amazon.com<\/a>\"\" \"\" —\u00a0<\/span> Amazon.co.uk<\/a><\/p>\n

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