Mutiny on the Bounty is a 1962 American historical drama film released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, directed by Lewis Milestone and starring Marlon Brando, Trevor Howard, Richard Harris, Hugh Griffith, Richard Haydn and Tarita in her only role. The screenplay was written by Charles Lederer (with uncredited input from Eric Ambler, William L. Driscoll, Borden Chase, John Gay, and Ben Hecht), based on the 1932 novel by Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall. Bronisław Kaper composed the score.
The film tells a heavily fictionalized story of the real-life mutiny led by Fletcher Christian against William Bligh, captain of HMAV Bounty, in 1789. It is the second American film produced by MGM to be based on the novel, the first being the 1935 film of the same name, which was also based on the Nordhoff-Hall novel.
Mutiny on the Bounty was the first motion picture filmed in the Ultra Panavision 70 widescreen process. It was partly shot on location in the South Pacific and became the most expensive film ever made (soon replaced by Cleopatra). The film had a troubled production, with Marlon Brando clashing with original director Carol Reed and eventually facilitating his firing and replacement with Lewis Milestone. This was Milestone's final film before his death in 1980.
The film was released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer on November 8, 1962. It received mixed-to-negative reviews from critics and was a box office flop, losing more than $6 million (equivalent to $ million in ). Nonetheless, Mutiny on the Bounty was nominated for seven Oscars at the 35th Academy Awards, including for Best Picture.
Plot In 1787, the HMS Bounty sets sail from England for Tahiti under the command of William Bligh. His mission is to collect a shipload of breadfruit saplings and transport them to Jamaica, in the hopes that they can be used as cheap food for plantation slaves. Bligh is an experienced seaman and a competent officer, but also arrogant, dismissive of his green crew, and eager to complete the unpleasant voyage as quickly as possible.
The voyage gets off to a difficult start when a sailor, John Mills, is severely flogged for accusing Bligh of stealing cheese from the ship's stores to the disgust of Acting Lieutenant Fletcher Christian. Bligh tries to reach Tahiti sooner by attempting the shorter westbound route around Cape Horn. The strategy fails and the Bounty backtracks eastward, costing the mission much precious time. Bligh blames the men, cutting their rations and working them even harder.
When the Bounty reaches her destination, the crew revels in the easygoing life of the tropical paradise – and in the free-love practices of the Tahitian women. Christian himself is smitten with Maimiti, daughter of the Tahitian king. Bligh's agitation is further fueled by learning that the dormancy period of the breadfruit means more wasted months until the plants can be potted. As departure day nears, three men, including Mills, attempt to desert but are caught by Christian and clapped in irons by Bligh.
Bligh decides to take twice as many plants as planned for, ordering the crew to be allotted less water so they can be watered properly. A thirst-stricken crewmember falls to his death, and his mate is fatally keelhauled for striking Bligh in anger. Mills taunts Christian, trying to egg him on to challenge Bligh. When a third man becomes gravely ill from drinking seawater, Christian attempts to give him fresh water in violation of the Captain's orders. Bligh beats Christian when he ignores his second order to stop. In response, Christian backhands Bligh. Bligh informs Christian that he will be tried and likely hanged when they reach port.
With nothing left to lose, Christian seizes command of the ship and sets Bligh and a group of loyalists adrift in the longboat with a compass and meager rations, telling them to make for the island of Tofua. Bligh, bent on revenge, avoids Tofua and the rest of the islands by lying to his loyalists about the locals there practicing cannibalism, and instead crossing the Pacific westward in order to reach the Dutch colony of Kupang at Timor. He returns to Britain with remarkable speed and weeks later, a court-martial exonerates Bligh of any misdeeds for the loss of the Bounty and recommends an expedition to arrest the mutineers and bring them to trial. To Bligh's dismay, however, the court also determines that his appointment to command Bounty was a mistake. This conclusion is based on the fact that several superb officers with commendable records participated in the mutiny against him.
Christian sails back to Tahiti to pick up supplies, Maimiti and the girlfriends of the crew. They sail for a permanent home until reaching Pitcairn Island, which is marked incorrectly on British naval charts and would therefore be impossible to find. However, once on Pitcairn, Christian decides to sail home, fearing that Bligh will be exonerated without his testimony. In response, Mills orders the Bounty set aflame while Christian is searching for Bligh's sextant. The mortally burned Christian escapes and dies next to Maimiti as the flaming Bounty sinks.
Cast
Credits from the AFI Catalog of Feature Films.
Production
Development and writing Following the success of 1935's Mutiny on the Bounty, director Frank Lloyd announced plans in 1940 to make a sequel that focused on Captain Bligh in later life, to star Spencer Tracy or Charles Laughton. No film resulted. In 1945 Casey Wilson wrote a script for Christian of the Bounty, which was to star Clark Gable as Fletcher Christian and focus on Christian's life on Pitcairn Island. This was never filmed. In the 1950s, MGM remade a number of their earlier successes in color and widescreen formats, including Scaramouche and The Prisoner of Zenda. They decided to remake Mutiny on the Bounty, and in 1958 the studio announced that Aaron Rosenberg would produce the film. Marlon Brando was mentioned as a possible star.
Eric Ambler was signed to write a script at $5,000 per week. It was supposed to combine material from the Nordhoff and Hall novels Mutiny on the Bounty and Pitcairn Island. MGM also owned the rights to a third book, Men Against the Sea, which dealt with Bligh's boat voyage after the mutiny. In 1959, Paramount announced that it would make a rival Bounty film, to be written and directed by James Clavell and called The Mutineers. It would focus on the fate of the Mutineers on Pitcairn Island. However, this project did not proceed.
Rosenberg said the film would focus more on the fate of the crew after the mutiny, with Captain Bligh only in a minor role and the mutiny dealt with in flashback. "It was Brando's idea", said Rosenberg. "And he was right. It has always been fascinating to wonder what happened to the mutineers afterwards." "The mood after the mutiny must be one of hope", said Reed. "The men hope to live a different sort of life, a life without suffering, without brutality. They hope for a life without sick ambitions, without the pettiness of personal success. They dream of a new life where nobody is trying to outdo the next person."
Ambler says his brief was to make Fletcher Christian's part as interesting as Bligh's. MGM executives were unhappy with Ambler's script, although the writer estimated he did 14 drafts. John Gay was signed to write a version in July 1960. Eventually, William Driscoll, Borden Chase (writing in August 1960), Howard Clewes and Charles Lederer wrote all the scripts. According to one report, Ambler did the first third of the film, about the journey, Driscoll did the second, about life on Tahiti, and Chase did the third, about the mutiny and afterwards. Gay wrote the narration. Lederer was included before filming was to begin.
Casting Marlon Brando eventually signed with MGM, at a fee of $500,000 plus 10% of the profits. Carol Reed was hired to direct. In order to take full advantage of Technicolor and the widescreen format (shooting in MGM Camera 65), the production was to be filmed on location in Tahiti, with cinematographer Robert Surtees. The film was set to begin shooting on October 15, 1960. It was nicknamed "MGM's Ben Hur of 1961." Brando wrote in his memoirs that he was offered the lead in Lawrence of Arabia around the same time but chose the Bounty because he preferred to go to Tahiti, a place that had long fascinated him, rather than film six months in the desert. "Lean was a very good director, but he took so long to make a movie that I would have dried up in the desert like a puddle of water", wrote Brando.; hereinafter cited Brando.
In July 1960, Peter Finch signed to play Bligh. However, by August the role had gone to Trevor Howard. Brando personally selected a local Tahitian, Tarita, to play his love interest. They began a real relationship in 1962, had children, and separated by 1972.
Filming Under Carol Reed A working replica of the Bounty was constructed in Nova Scotia at a cost of $750,000 and was sailed to Tahiti. The ship took nine months to build rather than the scheduled six and arrived in Tahiti after filming had begun. Shooting was originally scheduled to begin in October 1960; however, problems with the script and delays in construction of the ship pushed it back until November. More than 150 members of the cast and crew arrived in Tahiti, and MGM rented over 200 hotel rooms.
Shooting commenced on November 28. Filming was difficult, partly because the script was being rewritten and Brando was reportedly ad-libbing much of his part. Production costs were also high due to the remote location. Despite the ongoing changes to the script and the production's financial and logistical problems, Brando later wrote about how much he enjoyed the island and his interactions with its native people:
In January 1961, after three months of filming, Reed flew back from location with an "undisclosed ailment". Reportedly, his departure was due to bouts with gallstones and heat stroke, although other reports stated that Reed was instead unhappy over differences with the direction of the story. By that time, the rainy season had arrived, so filming halted and the unit returned to Hollywood.
Reed's wife, Penelope Dudley-Ward, wrote to her cousin David Birkin from the Beverly Wilshire Hotel on February 25:
When MGM demanded that Reed finish the film within 100 days, the director replied that he needed 139, so the studio fired him. Brando claims in his memoirs that Reed was dismissed by MGM because he wanted to make Bligh the hero.Brando, p. 270.
Under Lewis Milestone Reed was replaced by Lewis Milestone, in what turned out to be his last job at directing a theatrical film. "Reed was used to making his own pictures", said Milestone. "He was not used to producer, studio and star interference. But those of us who have been around Hollywood are like alley cats. We know this style. We know how to survive."
Milestone later said, "I felt it would be an easy assignment because they'd been on it for months and there surely couldn't be much left to do."Higham, Charles; Greenberg, Joel (1971). The celluloid muse; Hollywood directors speak. Regnery, p. 193; hereinafter cited "Higham". However, Milestone then discovered that only one seven-minute scene (Bligh giving instructions about obtaining breadfruit) had been completed.
In March 1961, filming resumed at MGM studios in Culver City. Milestone said that for his first two weeks on the film "Brando behaved himself and I got a lot of stuff done", such as the arrival of the Bounty at Tahiti. The director says he "got on beautifully with" the British actors. "They were real human beings and I had a lot of fun."