The Caine Mutiny
US (1954): Drama
Not rated, Color, 125 minutes
Available on videocassette and videodisc
Academy Award Nominee
Baseline's Motion Picture Guide Review, 4 stars
The Caine Mutiny|US (1954): Drama
The Caine Mutiny is a strong enough story to have withstood adaptation from Herman Wouk's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel into a Broadway play, and subsequently into the screenplay for this film.
Synopsis
Sewing with Capt. Queeg. Ensign Willie Keith (Robert Francis), Lt. Steve Maryk (Johnson), and Lt. Tom Keefer (Fred MacMurray) are shipmates early in WW II aboard the Caine, a destroyer-cum-minesweeper. Capt. Philip Francis Queeg (Humphrey Bogart, in one of his greatest performances) boards the ship as her new captain and immediately establishes both his power over the men and his neurosis about cleanliness. He is so intent on running a spotless ship that in the midst of target practice, he berates a young tar and loses control of the ship, which promptly sails in a circle and cuts her own tow line.
Additional incidents follow indicating that Bogart is suffering from stress. Johnson begins to keep a log on Bogart's behavior, and MacMurray insidiously plants the seed that the captain may be about to go off the deep end. During a storm at sea, Bogart appears indecisive, and Johnson invokes a Navy rule regarding relief of a captain in an emergency. The ship is saved, but Johnson is court-martialed.
The court-martial. Lt. Barney Greenwald (Jose Ferrer) is assigned to defend the young lieutenant against Lt. Cmdr. Challee (E.G. Marshall) for the Navy's prosecution. Evidence mounts against Johnson when his fellow officers back away from assuming any responsibility for his actions, even though they had encouraged him at the time. Finally, in a masterful denouement, Ferrer gets Bogart on the stand and proceeds to destroy the already-shaky psyche of the old sailor. In the movie's most famous scene, Bogart reaches for the steel ball bearings that he always carries and begins to play with them to ease the tension of the moment. The other naval officers now realize that Bogart is cracking up, and the charges against Johnson are dismissed.
Later, at a celebration, Ferrer arrives and tells off the crew, citing Bogart's long record as a lifetime sailor who was protecting the United States' shores years before these civilian types entered the wartime servic. Ferrer finishes his monolog by tossing his champagne in the face of the real villain MacMurray.
Critique
The scenes with Bogart disintegrating on the witness stand have become part of American folklore. This is a don't-miss picture, unnecessarily beefed up with a concocted love story between May Wynn and Robert Francis that goes nowhere but adds to an already-fat script. (Wynn, by the way, uses her own name in the film.) The character did not appear in the play, but novelist-playwright Wouk didn't object. Bogart was later asked how he managed to capture so masterfully the paranoid personality of Queeg. "Simple," growled Bogie, "everybody knows I'm nuts, anyway."
Awards
In a year other than the one in which On the Waterfront was released, this film and its star might have won Oscars for Best Picture and Best Actor (Bogart was nominated, but Marlon Brando took home the trophy). Also nominated were Tom Tully for his supporting performance, Stanley Roberts for his screenplay, and Max Steiner for his score. Technical credits are all excellent (Caine also earned nominations for Best Film Editing and Best Sound Recording), especially the typhoon scene created by Lawrence Butler.
Copyright (c) 1993, Microsoft Corp, taken from Cinemania '94.
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