TWO YEARS BEFORE THE MAST
(Paramount)
HIS is not the first screen version of a popular book which is several times more lurid than,*the original, but it must be one of the few
which have added to, rather than detracted from, the social content. Richard Henry Dana’s autobiographical account of a trip around the Horn in a sailing vessel 100 years ago was largely instrumental in getting a fair deal for Ameri-) can merchant seamen, but it was mild by comparison with this screenplay which hits the ship-owners between wind and water, presenting them as soulless money-grubbers who employed ruthless captains to treat their crews worse than dogs. This, however, makes for adventurous entertainment if not for strict historical accuracy. When the schooner Pilgrim sets sail from Boston she carries aboard her half the tough guys in Hollywoodincluding Alan Ladd, Brian Donlevy, William Bendix, Barry Fitzgerald (in the cook’s galley, of course), and Howard da Silva (excellent as the icily aweinspiring captain). After beating around Cape Horn, they pick up a wholly unnecessary and incongruous pas- . senger, in the person of a Spanish grandee’s. beauteous daughter, which results in a certain amount of beating about the bush; but for the most part Two Years’ Before the Mast is 90 minutes of shanghai-ing, flogging, murder, mutiny, storms, scurvy, and no beg pardons. i
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/NZLIST19470307.2.53.1.2
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 16, Issue 402, 7 March 1947, Page 34
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222TWO YEARS BEFORE THE MAST New Zealand Listener, Volume 16, Issue 402, 7 March 1947, Page 34
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Copyright in the work University Entrance by Janet Frame (credited as J.F., 22 March 1946, page 18), is owned by the Janet Frame Literary Trust. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this article and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the New Zealand Listener. You can search, browse, and print this article for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from the Janet Frame Literary Trust for any other use.
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