Captains Courageous (1937)

Purely Joyful Movie!

It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Captain Courageous is a warm story on human, rather parental relationships, love and coming of age. An adventure story to spice up the relationship between an older and a younger character is hit. Fleming is clearly focused on the relationship between fishermen and boys and allow the atmosphere to grow with this relationship.Spencer Tracy as Manuel Fidello. He has both feet on the ground tighter. In this case, in the sea. Tracy really develops this role into a memorable character. Manuel is developing into an unforgettable character. I could not call him a father figure. His attention and love grow with the works. He is everything that a boy need. Growing up is perhaps in this case too quickly. I know, under the circumstances is acceptable. Character fisherman Manuel has become a universal value. The stereotype is not the case.Freddie Bartholomew as Harvey Cheyne is convincing and visible change of character. I'm with the enjoyment of watching this little spoiled and rich jerk who by sheer accident suddenly grow up. In the end I remained touched by the behavior of his. The change is pretty interesting. Harvey is still playful and rich boy who learned to fish and appreciate the true human values.Lionel Barrymore (Captain Disko Troop) and Melvyn Douglas (Frank Burton Cheyne) are excellent also.This is a very lively and exciting movie. The majestic sea scenery accompanies excellent acting and good dramaturgy. A film that is hard to forget.

Freddy Bartholomew's turn as Harvey Cheyne is one of the truly great child performances. When at his boarding school and at his family home, he is everything we should detest and yet we see the potential good in him and rejoice at his transformation. He is transformed by the tough love of Manuel and the crew of the "We're Here". The scene where Captain Disco, inimitably played by Lionel Barrymore, wallops Harvey across the side of the head to stop his tirade against the crew is classic. Disco didn't really want to do it but there was nothing else left to do. Harvey learns to forgive and forget and get on with the business of fishing just as the crew does for him. Even the crew's gruff cynic, Long Jack, who has been skewered by hooks as a result of Harvey deliberately fouling his lines in order to help Manuel win a bet, finally offers Harvey Manuel's razor as a sign of respect for Harvey's genuine redemption as a valuable crew member.Harvey learns human values and to feel the thrill of working with others as equals with a common purpose. At first he scoffs the fact that all Manuel's father left him was a hurdy-gurdy and at the end of the voyage he values the hurdy-gurdy beyond measure as a memento of his now dead dory mate and mentor, Manuel. And the few dollars he earns as a crew member is valued beyond his father's millions. Freddy makes these things real for us and this is his gift.Lastly, I dare you not to cry when Harvey asks God to keep a place for him in Manuel's dory in heaven, even if you are not a believer.

CAPTAIN'S COURAGEOUS (Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, 1937), directed by Victor Fleming, from a literary classic by Rudyard Kipling, stars child actor Freddie Bartholomew in another one of his classic film roles. Having played Charles Dicken's immortal character of "David Copperfield" (MGM, 1935) and the title role of "Little Lord Fauntleroy" (United Artists, 1936), his portrayal of Harvey Cheyne no doubt tops them all. Regardless of this being a Bartholomew starrer and his character study from start to finish, the end result turns out to be an Academy Award winning performance for Spencer Tracy as Best Actor in what's actually a supporting category.The story introduces Harvey Elsworth Cheyne (Freddie Bartholomew), a ten-year-old lad, who, unknown to his business-tycoon father, Frank Burton Cheyne (Melvyn Douglas), that his own son is a pampered, obnoxious rich boy who believes he can get his own way by lying, cheating and making demands on others, especially his friends and live-in servants. While attending the Green Hill School for Boys, Harvey becomes very unpopular when discovered to have bribed a fellow student with a rare first edition of "Treasure Island" and offering $50 to his teacher, Bob Tyler (Donald Briggs), in order to make his exams easier for him to pass. After getting a punch in the nose by one of the boys, Harvey leaves school and turns to his father for moral support. After learning the truth from the school board members and of Harvey's suspension, Cheyne, at the advise of Doctor C.A. Finlay (Walter Kingsford), agrees to spend quality time with Harvey on an ocean lining cruise bound for Europe where father and son can get to know and understand each other better. On their first day out, Cheyne attends to business, leaving Harvey to make an impression on a couple of boy passengers (Wally Albright and Tommy Bupp) by treating them to large ice cream sodas. Harvey, showing off, drinks and finishes all six of them in one sitting. An upset stomach causes Harvey to break away from the boys, who follow him to watch him get sick. Hiding behind a lifeboat, Harvey falls overboard into the ocean where he's spotted by Manuel Fidello (Spencer Tracy), a Portuguese fisherman. Maniel picks up the half-drowned boy, placing him into his row boat. Taken onto a vessel, "We're Here," consisting of fellow crew members as the pipe smoking Captain Disko Troop (Lionel Barrymore), his son, Dan (Mickey Rooney), Long Jack (John Carradine), Uncle Salters, (Charley Grapewin), Doc, the cook (Sam McDaniel), among others, the now conscience Harvey becomes appalled that he's unable to return back to his father or be taken to New York, having to remain on board the New England schooner for three months before they port back to Gloucester, Massachusetts. Because Manuel fished Harvey out of the ocean, it is now Manuel's responsibility to watch over this rebellious "Little Fish," humiliated for having to work among the other fishermen for #3 a month.Whether CAPTAINS COURAGEOUS is faithful to the Kipling novel or not really doesn't matter, for that it's a great film that can be reviewed numerous times without any loss of interest. Freddie Bartholomew shows what a remarkable young actor he's become. Outstanding performance, second to Bartholomew, goes to Spencer Tracy as the kind-hearted fisherman who goes through his taming of the shrew with a boy named Harvey. While the role of Manuel could have enacted by notable accented speaking veteran actors as J. Carrol Naish or Leo Carrillo, the big surprise comes from Tracy, the curly dark-haired Portuguese with spoken dialect. Classic moment comes from Manuel's playing the vielle as he sings, "Don't Cry Little Fish." Franz Waxman and Gus Kahn, who composed this little ditty, also took part in another, "Oh, What a Terrible Ma," sung by the fishing crew while chopping their bait. Honorable mention goes to John Carradine playing one of the other fishermen, and his confrontation with Manuel after threatening to "beat the ears off" of Harvey for playing such a horrible prank on him. It is during this tense moment that Tracy's Manuel briefly loses his accent defending the boy. Lionel Barrymore's finest moments come when giving Harvey his long awaited slap, and quoting what's become the moral of the story, "A boy is never too old to need a dad." One curious item that should have been included in the screenplay are possible scenes revolving around Cheyne's reaction after disappearance of his son, what measures he goes through to have him found, and wondering whether or not he survived the fall into the ocean.Though CAPTAINS COURAGEOUS had been imitated, but not credited to Kipling, for the western, CATTLE DRIVE (Columbia, 1951) starring Joel McCrea and Dean Stockwell in the Tracy and Bartholomew roles, the Kipling tale was retold twice as made-for-television movies, first in 1977 starring Jonathan Kahn and Ricardo Montalban (as Manuel), and again in 1996 with Robert Ulrich and Kenny Vadas. Distributed to home video and later DVD, CAPTAINS COURAGEOUS turns up occasionally on Turner Classic Movies cable channel. For anyone who's never seen the original, give it a try. It's definitely a winner. "Ye ho little fish, don't cry, don't cry. Ye ho, little fish, don't cry, don't cry." (****)

With Captains Courageous director Victor Fleming and his scenarists pull off a nail-biting high seas adventure laced with powerful emotions. This adaptation of a Kipling story begins psychologically and on land as we are introduced to a nasty, spoiled, rich kid (Freddie Bartholomew) who uses his social standing to get whatever he wants. When he goes too far and gets suspended from school, his neglectful and over-indulgent father (Melvyn Douglas) decides to take him on a trans-Atlantic voyage to reconnect and bring his offspring into line. However, after showing off to some other kids by buying and drinking five chocolate sodas, the queasy boy falls overboard. He is scooped out of the water by a Portuguese fisherman named Manuel (Spencer Tracy) and deposited on a fishing trawler captained by crusty Lionel Barrymore and a seasoned crew. There, predictably, the tough seafarers knock him down to size and force him to grow up. Although Tracy won an Oscar for his portrayal of the saintly Manuel, equally impressive is 10-year-old Freddie Bartholomew in his evolution from a clever but destructive and insensitive little brat to a responsible, productive young man, all the while gradually bonding with Tracy whom he comes to regard as a father figure. The film seesaws from high action, with the crew struggling to harvest the bounty of the pitiless ocean in competition with rival trawlers, to intimate drama as Bartholomew slowly and painfully learns that the world does not revolve around him and his immediate needs. The production itself holds up very well. The viewer's nose is rubbed into the slime and grime of primitive fish processing in several sequences that also serve to put us into the child's position, thereby strengthening the impact of his ordeal in our imaginations. Close shots of shipboard life are seamlessly intercut with long shots of actual vessels on the open sea. Among the supporting players, it is a pleasure to report that Mickey Rooney and John Carradine actually get to play regular guys instead of the "types" usually assigned to them.It is the combination of the deep and timeless emotions connected with the parent-child relationship and old-fashioned adventure skillfully presented that make this one a classic.