The Bounty (1984)

Best movie of this year hands down!

Simply Perfect

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

The imdb synopsis of Roger Donaldson's The Bounty goes something like this: Fed up with their captain's harsh discipline, a sailing ship crew decides to take action. Well, this sort of makes the point clear, however this feature film is so much more. Consisting of a cast filled with thespians and newcomers who would go on to shine on their own later The Bounty is a rousing sea story made all the more astonishing by the fact that it actually happened. Anthony Hopkins, Mel Gibson, Daniel Day Lewis and Liam Neeson star in this unforgettable tale of treachery on the high seas. Despite being well over three decades old The Bounty has lost none of its impact.

Continuing my plan to watch every movie in Mel Gibson's filmography in order, I come to The Bounty (1984)Plot In A Paragraph: A more accurate re telling of the famous mutiny on the bounty featuring Fletcher Christian (Gibson) and Captain William Bligh (Anthony Hopkins)Gibson is OK here, if a little bland at times. We don't really get a lot from him here. He doesn't have that much dialogue either, I wonder if it was a conscious decision to have him hardly speak like in Road Warrior (his most successful movie at that point) and have him so quiet. He is OK, but I couldn't help but notice how little dialogue he had. In a great performance, Hopkins plays Bligh as more complicated man rather than an outright cruel villain. And whilst being closer to the truth makes the movie better for me, it does however make the mutineers seem like spoiled school kids fed up with a strict teacher. As for the rest of the cast Laurence Olivier hams it up and it's interesting to note Daniel Day Lewis and Liam Neeson pop up in early roles too. It's well directed, well acted and has some impressive set pieces. My blu ray looks great with a good transfer. There is a surprising amount of nudity for a pg movie too.Highly recommended. The Bounty only grossed $8 million at the domestic Box Office to end 1984 as the 86th highest grossing movies of the year.

I want to make it clear that I liked this film. The acting was good, the cinematography outstanding and the story compelling. The scenes of Bligh at the Admiralty were excellent and well-timed. However, there were some missing elements that would have enhanced the effectiveness of the scenes and the movie as-a-whole.Most of what I consider to be critical-yet-absent stuff is character development: What is Bligh's past, and why was he so adamant on challenging the "roaring forties" at Cape Horn? How did Mr. Christian become an officer in the Royal Navy and then, quickly, lose all sense-of-duty or even interest in sailing after a Polynesian girl gives him "the eye"?Other un-adressed equations are: Just how dangerous was it for a ship to challenge Cape Horn? Could they have done it some other time-of-year? Was Bligh's intended revisit to the Cape the sole reason for the crew's mutiny?One scene I found most unconvincing was the scene where Bligh barks out orders to clean and maintain the ship. This would have been de rigeur on any vessel at the time. Crews clean and maintain and test endlessly, and the scenes of the crew demoralized and unhappy about having to clean are laughable.The music by Vangelis did not help the scenes, nor add to their effectiveness. I will never know just how dangerous the mission "around the horn" would have been for the Bounty, because it is never explained: Just a few more lines of dialogue would have been adequate.If I fill in the holes, I see a lieutenant obsessed with making a mark that will earn him the rank of captain. We see a crew that has found paradise and doesn't want to leave. We see a fair first mate who is somewhat sympathetic to the crewmembers. The Bounty needed to introduce us to Bligh, the man, his history, his psychology. We needed to have-described the history of Cape Horn, in regards to previous, attempted navigation and passage of sailing vessels. We need to know why Mr. Christian incited mutiny: Because of cleaning duties? I think not. If these elements had been fleshed-out in the movie, I would have been much more engaged.

Roger Donaldson directed this superb film, a remake of the 1935 original that had starred Clark Gable & Charles Laughton. Here, Mel Gibson & Anthony Hopkins play friends turned bitter enemies Fletcher Christian and Captain Bligh, who sail the Bounty on a trading mission to Tahiti, where most of the crew are seduced by this paradise of great weather, abundant food, water...and beautiful native women. After leaving the island, Christian leads a mutiny, takes over the ship and goes back to Tahiti, setting Bligh and his loyal officers adrift, where they amazingly survive horrendous conditions, and Bligh leads another ship back there to punish them, though they had already left for parts unknown... Well-acted, directed, and scored film vividly shows the futility of mutiny and desertion, and the high price the mutineers will face. Fine script evenly balances the stubborn but honorable Bligh with the equally determined but erratic Christian. Can hold its own against the Academy Award winning original, and deserves to be better known and acclaimed.