Abby Mann and Stanley Kramer came together again after their classic collaboration in "Judgment at Nuremberg" and became the nucleus of a tremendous cast and crew that put together another great film.
Oskar Werner heads an amazing ensemble in a powerful performance as the ill-fated ship's doctor. His performance simmers underneath an outer-shell of quiet desperation. Simone Signoret is very moving as the drug addicted, La Condesa.
Marvin is the comic relief for the film but does it in such a rare and textured way. His scenes with the great Michael Dunn are a classic in timing, truthfully theatrical behavior and sheer risk-taking in terms of the moments played. This is especially so in the "I could never hit a curve ball" scene. Marvin was a truly dangerously exciting and spontaneous talent--and very, very underrated as a complete actor who could do it all.
Michael Dunn is the narrator and conscience of the film. He is the character who is both a part of the "Fools" on board and yet he is also one out of time having the point of view of the audience; knowing what lies in the future. In the scene with Heinz Rühmann as Julius Lowenthal the Jewish salesman, Lowenthal suggests that patience is the way to deal with the Nazi's; "After all there are one million Jews in Germany. What do you think they will do? Kill us all?!" The tragic look on Dunn's face says it all. This was Dunn's first major film role and what a giant talent lay within that small frame.
Vivien Leigh is sadly and ironically wonderful in her final screen role. She has some savagely comic scenes with Lee Marvin, the last one being a scene where he mistakenly in the dark takes her for one of the prostitutes aboard the ship and she beats him to a pulp.
Jose Greco as Pepe, the head of the Spanish Dance troupe who also pimps for some of his dancers is excellent in a role of a hard-bitten and malevolent character.
George Segal and Elizabeth Ashley do the best they can in perhaps the most poorly written roles as the star-crossed young lovers. Jose Ferrer does a great job as the nazi bigot, Rieber. He brings humor and fullness of character to a very unsympathetic and frightening role. Barbara Luna, Lila Skala (Mother Maria to Syney Poitier's Homer Smith in "Lilies of the Field"), Werner Klemperer and virtually the entire ensemble all turn in moving and fully-lived performances.
Heinz Rühmann is wonderful as the Jewish salesman. He brings humor and an understated pathos to the role. Charles Korvin is fine as the Captain who is also Oskar Werner's friend and confidant. Alf Kjellin a very good actor often reduced to playing Nazis in American films is quite moving as the guilt-ridden Herr Freytag.
Ernst Gold's music is exciting using influences of both German and Spanish music. Stanley Kramer, the film making conscience of his time pulls together a great production as both producer and director in what was a remarkable string of great films.
This is not an overtly hopeful story. The film is full of ironies from the understated to those we are hit over the head with; and rightfully so. For these were and are extreme times. We as the audience know too much about what lies ahead for most of these people as they feebly try to position themselves while the world screams ever-closer towards war. While it was a statement about times past, one can be sure that Kramer and Mann both meant it to be a statement about us all when we give in to those motivations that create apathy and self-indulgence. It is perhaps hopeful in that if you can see yourself in some or one of the characters perhaps it will accompany the insight that can bring the perspective to change and the sympathy and humor to have compassion for ourselves and all the rest of us who are all trying to find their way home.
Finally,I must take exception to another comment made that suggests that the film, and I quote; "is very preachy about prejudice, but then Hollywood was full of Jewish people and they always loved a film set against anti-Semitism." First of all it is a sad generalization that suggests the ignorance of the writer. Second it is not true at all that those who were of the Jewish faith "always loved a film set against anti-Semitism." There were actually at the time only a handful of Hollywood films that even dealt with the subject. Some of those included the earlier Kramer/Mann collaboration Judgment at Nuremberg" and the first one of it's kind, "Gentleman's Agreement". The latter film being the first to really attack anti-Semitism was strongly opposed by those of the studio heads that were of the Jewish faith. They were actually, sadly overly careful about any anti-Jewish subject matter. They did not want to call attention to their being Jewish and often went out of their way to ignore the subject. One case in point was the film "The Seventh Cross" with Spencer Tracy as one of seven concentration camp victims who escapes and is hunted down one by one by the Nazis. This film never acknowledges the treatment of Jews at all. The majority of the films of the 40's - 60's that tried to deal with the issues of prejudice of any kind were almost single-handedly dealt with by Stanley Kramer alone in films like "The Defiant Ones", "Nuremberg", "Ship of Fools", "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" and "The Home of the Brave". Kramer the lone voice of moral justice amongst filmmakers was not Jewish. Steven Spielberg's "Schindler's List" was actually the first feature film to deal solely with the experience of life in a concentration camp. So much for the other subscriber's narrow and sadly prejudiced view.
Oskar Werner heads an amazing ensemble in a powerful performance as the ill-fated ship's doctor. His performance simmers underneath an outer-shell of quiet desperation. Simone Signoret is very moving as the drug addicted, La Condesa.
Marvin is the comic relief for the film but does it in such a rare and textured way. His scenes with the great Michael Dunn are a classic in timing, truthfully theatrical behavior and sheer risk-taking in terms of the moments played. This is especially so in the "I could never hit a curve ball" scene. Marvin was a truly dangerously exciting and spontaneous talent--and very, very underrated as a complete actor who could do it all.
Michael Dunn is the narrator and conscience of the film. He is the character who is both a part of the "Fools" on board and yet he is also one out of time having the point of view of the audience; knowing what lies in the future. In the scene with Heinz Rühmann as Julius Lowenthal the Jewish salesman, Lowenthal suggests that patience is the way to deal with the Nazi's; "After all there are one million Jews in Germany. What do you think they will do? Kill us all?!" The tragic look on Dunn's face says it all. This was Dunn's first major film role and what a giant talent lay within that small frame.
Vivien Leigh is sadly and ironically wonderful in her final screen role. She has some savagely comic scenes with Lee Marvin, the last one being a scene where he mistakenly in the dark takes her for one of the prostitutes aboard the ship and she beats him to a pulp.
Jose Greco as Pepe, the head of the Spanish Dance troupe who also pimps for some of his dancers is excellent in a role of a hard-bitten and malevolent character.
George Segal and Elizabeth Ashley do the best they can in perhaps the most poorly written roles as the star-crossed young lovers. Jose Ferrer does a great job as the nazi bigot, Rieber. He brings humor and fullness of character to a very unsympathetic and frightening role. Barbara Luna, Lila Skala (Mother Maria to Syney Poitier's Homer Smith in "Lilies of the Field"), Werner Klemperer and virtually the entire ensemble all turn in moving and fully-lived performances.
Heinz Rühmann is wonderful as the Jewish salesman. He brings humor and an understated pathos to the role. Charles Korvin is fine as the Captain who is also Oskar Werner's friend and confidant. Alf Kjellin a very good actor often reduced to playing Nazis in American films is quite moving as the guilt-ridden Herr Freytag.
Ernst Gold's music is exciting using influences of both German and Spanish music. Stanley Kramer, the film making conscience of his time pulls together a great production as both producer and director in what was a remarkable string of great films.
This is not an overtly hopeful story. The film is full of ironies from the understated to those we are hit over the head with; and rightfully so. For these were and are extreme times. We as the audience know too much about what lies ahead for most of these people as they feebly try to position themselves while the world screams ever-closer towards war. While it was a statement about times past, one can be sure that Kramer and Mann both meant it to be a statement about us all when we give in to those motivations that create apathy and self-indulgence. It is perhaps hopeful in that if you can see yourself in some or one of the characters perhaps it will accompany the insight that can bring the perspective to change and the sympathy and humor to have compassion for ourselves and all the rest of us who are all trying to find their way home.
Finally,I must take exception to another comment made that suggests that the film, and I quote; "is very preachy about prejudice, but then Hollywood was full of Jewish people and they always loved a film set against anti-Semitism." First of all it is a sad generalization that suggests the ignorance of the writer. Second it is not true at all that those who were of the Jewish faith "always loved a film set against anti-Semitism." There were actually at the time only a handful of Hollywood films that even dealt with the subject. Some of those included the earlier Kramer/Mann collaboration Judgment at Nuremberg" and the first one of it's kind, "Gentleman's Agreement". The latter film being the first to really attack anti-Semitism was strongly opposed by those of the studio heads that were of the Jewish faith. They were actually, sadly overly careful about any anti-Jewish subject matter. They did not want to call attention to their being Jewish and often went out of their way to ignore the subject. One case in point was the film "The Seventh Cross" with Spencer Tracy as one of seven concentration camp victims who escapes and is hunted down one by one by the Nazis. This film never acknowledges the treatment of Jews at all. The majority of the films of the 40's - 60's that tried to deal with the issues of prejudice of any kind were almost single-handedly dealt with by Stanley Kramer alone in films like "The Defiant Ones", "Nuremberg", "Ship of Fools", "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" and "The Home of the Brave". Kramer the lone voice of moral justice amongst filmmakers was not Jewish. Steven Spielberg's "Schindler's List" was actually the first feature film to deal solely with the experience of life in a concentration camp. So much for the other subscriber's narrow and sadly prejudiced view.