Success or Snub? Mutiny on the Bounty (8th Academy Awards Review Pt. 2)

To see part 1, click here.

Captain Blood Suite~Erich Wolfgang Kornold - Captain Blood

One neat little milestone about this Oscar ceremony is this was the first time that the golden statuettes given out were actually called Oscars. Before this they were just called… awards, trophies, I dunno but they weren’t called Oscars.

While Mutiny on the Bounty was the biggest hit, and arguably most beloved film, of that year, it is actually one of the very few movies to actually win only Best Picture and nothing else. In fact, it’s the most recent movie to win Best Picture and nothing else, and this happened over 80 years ago. I mentioned that it filled up the Best Actor category but all of the nominees lost to Victor McLaglen’s performance in The Informer which is the first movie that we have to talk about.

Yes, The Informer was Mutiny on the Bounty’s big competition that year, winning the lion’s share of the awards. The film takes place in revolutionary Ireland and revolves around a local drunk named Gypo Nolan, played by McLaglen, whose friend, Frankie (Wallace Ford), is in the Irish Republican Army and being hunted by the British. Needing money for more booze, Gypo sells Frankie out to the British for the bounty on his head. Gypo is then approached by the rest of the IRA to help them in finding the mole who sold out Frankie, in other words, himself.

This sounds like a good idea for a movie, almost Hitchcockian in fact, but very little of the movie is actually spent on that murder-mystery case. Instead, most of it is spent watching this guy wander around, spending his money as he acts like a belligerent asshole, all while the IRA struggles to figure out a murder case that should be really easy to figure out.

You would think that this would be an interesting look at Irish culture but instead it seems to be revolving around the worst aspects of it, it’s more than a little stereotypical and, really, just say the premise out loud. The main character sells out his best friend for booze. How the Hell are you supposed to like this guy? Especially when he has no agency. All he does is sit around and whine about how bad his life sucks. And how the Hell did he beat out the three guys from Mutiny on the Bounty for the Best Acting Oscar?!

Moving on to the films that we’ll actually be talking about, all the other big movies of 1935 that were either considered for the Oscars (or should have been) can be divided into two categories. Films based on famous works and the more unique genre films. Let’s talk about the famous works first as this year saw several, many of which were nominated for awards.

1935 saw the first sound adaptations of David Copperfield (a coming-of-age story of an orphan that is loosely based on Charles Dickens’ own life),

Les Misérables (the epic decades-long story of a born-again Christian in 1800s France who tries to do right by everyone he meets),

Anna Karenina (a Russian socialite starts cheating on her abusive husband and society starts to judge her),

A Midsummer Night’s Dream (a Shakespearean comedy about a bunch of characters who get lost in an enchanted forest)

and The Three Musketeers (the adventures of a young squire who befriends the greatest musketeers in 1600s France).

None of these are often considered the best adaptations of their respective works (with the possible exception of A Midsummer Night’s Dream) but they are all very good (with the possible exception of The Three Musketeers).

Any one of these could be argued as the best movie of the year in its own right and most were nominated for the Outstanding Production but bizarrely snubbed for the Oscar for Best Adaptation (nowadays called the Best Adapted Screenplay). But enough about that, let’s instead start looking at the genre films.

For a milestone in comedy we have A Night at the Opera,

the next in the long line of films by the Marx Brothers, as well as the first to be made without Zeppo Marx, not that anyone probably minded all that much since he was the least funny member of the group anyway. Otis B. Driftwood (Groucho Marx) has been hired to help manage an opera company. While there, he befriends a couple of stage hands (Chico Marx and Harpo Marx), as well as an up and coming opera singer named Ricardo (Alan Jones, who I guess is replacing the character that Zeppo Marx would’ve played). Ricardo has dreams of both superstardom and falling in love with the leading lady of the opera named Rosa (Kitty Carlisle). So, Driftwood and the stage hands endeavor to help this poor guy out.

Coming off of the Marx Brothers’ previous works, A Night at the Opera definitely has far more of a cinematic touch to it. It’s hard to explain without really showing the films themselves back to back but their earlier films felt more like elongated vaudeville skits than 3-act stories. They would usually just revolve around them making jokes and then have a story near the end to just make more jokes. Even Duck Soup (1933), which I absolutely loved, doesn’t really follow the characters on any sort of arc. A Night at the Opera does. Even though the Marx brothers’ characters are still played up for laughs, they’re a lot nicer in this film and you really get behind their journey a lot more. It’s kinda this nice crossroad between Chaplin’s heartwarming City Lights (1931) and the zaniness that would inspire the Looney Toons.

Even though A Night at the Opera definitely has a lot more pathos to it than previous Marx Brothers films, that’s not to say that the pathos is all there is to it. This movie is funny. And I’m not just saying that in the sense of the 30s; like there’s parts of this movie that still got me to laugh out loud, and it’s often considered the Marx Brothers’ best film, often appearing on several lists for funniest movies of all time. For my money, I still think that Duck Soup is the funnier film and I enjoy the satire there a bit more, but this is still one that’s worth checking out.

Cecil B. DeMille made a pretty cool movie this year too, The Crusades.

While it’s called The Crusades it’s more based on the Third Crusade, specifically focusing the clash between King Richard the Lionheart of England (Henry Wilcoxon) and Saladin, the Sultan of Islam (Ian Keith) as well as all the politics involved in this Holy War.

While it has all the epic scale and fun political plays that make Cecil B. DeMille’s films so great, it’s a bit of a downgrade coming off of Cleopatra (1934). While there are a lot of moving parts in the plot that make it fun, there’s unfortunately a few plot threads that end up going nowhere and the film takes a little too long to get on the road. The acting’s still great though and I do really like King Richard the Lionheart. 

The main reason why I think The Crusades deserves recognition (that was, once again, snubbed) is because of the finale. The ending of this film has the great-granddaddy of all epic battle scenes and, even more impressive for a film of its time period, it doesn’t suck. This is because instead of focusing on the fighting and what-have-you, they focus on the amazing set pieces such as siege towers and vats of molten metal being poured.

This is the kind of epic scale that makes DeMille’s movies so fun to watch and it makes for one Hell of a great finale. The Crusades would go on to be nominated for absolutely nothing except Best Cinematography (which it lost to A Midsummer Night’s Dream which… okay, fair enough).

Really, the big genre that made a stride in 1935 was the adventure film with three supposedly influential films coming out in the form of China Seas, The Lives of a Bengal Lancer and Captain Blood. All three of these films have been credited with making significant strides in the action-adventure genre and were nominated for Outstanding Production. I am however pretty skeptical of all these films being that influential.

China Seas in particular I don’t really get. China Seas is “renowned”, and I put that word in quotations, as it was produced by Irving Thalberg and considered the movie that Thalberg tested his adventure movie formula on. Thalberg was a major producer and writer from the Golden Age of Hollywood and had his hand in several of the films we’ve talked about such as Mutiny on the Bounty, Grand Hotel (1932), A Night at the Opera and so on and is considered one of the most important forerunners in the business.

Allegedly, he also invented the adventure script with China Seas with a formula that’s being used to this day. This quote comes from Wikipedia and the only other source I found online was a journal that was made specifically to say flowery things about Irving Thalberg, including several unsubstantiated claims that are questionable at best. Literally, it stops just short of saying that he died for our sins and rose from the dead 3 days later.

I bring this up because, just from what I’m seeing, China Seas does not have the action-adventure formula that is still used in Hollywood to this day; it has the one that was promptly discarded as soon as possible because it does not make for entertaining cinema. Really, it seems more like one of those Grand Hotel celebrity ensemble films, and a really bad one at that.

The Lives of a Bengal Lancer is a little bit more interesting though it hasn’t aged with the greatest of graces. Telling the story of a British dragoon stationed in India that shows down with the insidious Mohammed Khan (Douglas Dumbrille), it has interesting characters, casual racism and is very much glorifying the tribulations of the British Empire’s efforts in India. Similar to Cavalcade (1933), this is a kind of thinking that has gone the way of the dodo, though even at the time, Mutiny on the Bounty was a film daring to ask questions of this type of thinking while The Lives of a Bengal Lancer was celebrating it. Really, The Lives of a Bengal Lancer’s greatest influence was temporarily starting a genre of adventure films set in British-controlled India (see also: The Charge of the Light Brigade (1936), Wee Willie Winkie (1937), Gunga Din (1939)).

The last film of this trifecta, and the one that definitely has the most influence, is Captain Blood, which, along with the aforementioned The Three Musketeers, brought the swashbuckler back into the public eye. It’s very much the classic pirate movie, telling of the adventures that Captain Peter Blood (Errol Flynn) and his lovable band of pirates get into while sailing the Caribbean, evading the cruel Colonel Bishop (Lionel Atwill) and running into his beautiful niece, Arabella (Olivia de Havilland).

The swashbuckler is a genre of action film where most of the action revolves around swordplay. This was an especially common trend in the old days of filmmaking because, as mentioned in my review of Mutiny on the Bounty, they couldn’t film regular action scenes worth a damn. My guess is that this is a holdover from stage combat because swordplay on the stage had already been commonplace for so many years. So transitioning it over into film seemed like the next logical conclusion.

Swashbucklers had already been commonplace in the silent era with some of Douglas Fairbanks’ films but they seemed to go out of vogue once sound came around. This is because of the difficulties of early sound recording that required largely static filming and, thus, lack of big sets for swordplay. By 1935, however, the technology was getting good enough that America could see some sword fighting again.

These were like the superhero movies of their day; audiences loved going to the theater to watch a dashing hero get into sword fights with some evil bad guys. Most of these films often revolved around pirates, enough so that I think maybe 50% of this genre was buccaneer-based. This sub-genre became so popular that Walt Disney would ultimately make one of his most famous rides at his theme park, Pirates of the Caribbean, based entirely off of the tropes present in these films. Which would, in turn, serve as the influence for a film series that would bring the swashbuckler back into the public eye in the New Millennium. And it all started here in Captain Blood.

In addition, Captain Blood also defined a few careers. That’s Errol Flynn playing Blood and if that name rings a bell, that’s because the guy was the action star of his time. In fact, Captain Blood pretty much defined the trope for several old-school action stars that appeared in this film, both for Flynn as well as Olivia de Havilland and Basil Rathbone. Flynn would always play the dashing hero, Rathbone would play the evil villain and de Havilland would play the spunky love interest. It probably bears mentioning that Rathbone, while in this movie, isn’t actually the main villain, instead playing the secondary antagonist, Captain Levasseur, but the point still remains.

While this film did light the spark to bring the swashbucklers back into the fold, it’s interesting that there actually isn’t all that much swashbuckling present in this film. Most of the action scenes are either chases or ship-to-ship battles. The only real swordfight is during the showdown between Captain Blood and Captain Levasseur partway through the movie.

Also the swashbuckling is pretty bad here but I promise later films got better.

It’s amazing to think that just this concept of pirates going around fighting each other and this one small, tantalizing sword fight was big enough to start its own subgenre. On the movie as a whole, it hasn’t aged the best, especially compared to some of the later swashbucklers. It lacks the whimsical touch that makes these sorts of movies fun and there’s a lot more talking than doing. Still, it is a big influence and should be respected.

While that might make you think that it’s our frontrunner for the success or snub section, we actually have one more movie to talk about. Behold, the Bride of Frankenstein.

Not only is this another Universal horror movie that introduced another Universal horror icon with the Bride of Frankenstein, but this is also commonly considered the best of the Universal horror movies and one of the greatest horror movies ever made. All steep titles but Goddamn does it deserve it.

Bride of Frankenstein picks up right where Frankenstein (1931) left off as Dr. Frankenstein (once again played by Colin Clive) is left bedridden after his showdown with the monster after the end of the last film. While recuperating, he’s visited by an old friend, Professor-Doctor Pretorius (Ernest Thesiger). Pretorius has heard of Frankenstein’s experiments with creating life and wants in.

Meanwhile, the monster (Boris Karloff) has survived his battle with the mob and once more begins terrorizing the countryside. After numerous misadventures, he also returns to settle the score with Dr. Frankenstein and demand that the doctor make him a companion. Thus, Frankenstein is now being pressured by two outside parties, both of whom are demanding for him to get back to creating while he just wants to get out.

If the original Frankenstein created an icon, Bride of Frankenstein certainly defined it. The Monster is a much more interesting character in this film as it adapts the part of the book detailing his journey. Specifically, the fact that he genuinely wants companionship and love but because he’s a hideous freak of nature, people just want to attack and kill him. He, in turn, fights back, usually killing someone which causes the cycle to endlessly repeat itself. This makes him a much more 3-dimensional villain so that when it gets to the climax, you understand the lengths that he’s going to get his bride.

He also learns to speak in this film, which is where we learn his favorite adjective. In fact, there’s a lot of great lines in this movie, my favorite being this:

And of course, this film created yet another iconic horror villain with the Bride of Frankenstein (Elsa Lanchester). Kinda like seeing Dracula with his cape, that frizzy afro with the white streaks and the white smock is instantly iconic. It’s so iconic, in fact, that you might forget that she’s not in the movie for very long, only showing up at the very end. And, yeah, she doesn’t do much either, but her one scene while it lasts is a great one.

So these reasons are why Bride of Frankenstein is good. But there is a difference between being good and being great and also being considered the greatest of the Universal monster movies, which, granted, is a subjective title but, still, I think most would easily put it near the top. What makes it great is a few things. It takes all of the themes and motifs from Frankenstein and expands upon them to make them more disturbing.

The Monster isn’t just a monster; he’s also a victim. Playing God like Dr. Frankenstein did created problems not just for the people around him but also for the creation itself. The film goes the extra lengths to make it very disturbing. Once again, this is disturbing by 30s standards which equates to being really freaking cool by 2020s standards.

The climax of this movie is them putting the Bride of Frankenstein together. In the first movie, the experiment was pretty straightforward with no sound and straight-on camera shots. In Bride of Frankenstein, they pioneer the usage of Dutch angles (which is an angle where the camera is tilted) and add music and quick cuts to really make the scene feel a lot freakier. You really get the feeling that this is something very unnatural going on and it feels a lot more blasphemous.

But could Bride of Frankenstein be called the best of the year? Better than Mutiny on the Bounty even? Man, is this a hard call, we had a solid line-up of movies this year. And, in true Academy fashion, almost none of them made it to the nominees list. But I digress, let’s just look at this from the perspective of the time in terms of influence.

While Captain Blood was a big influence on the film industry, I don’t think it’s quite on the same level of quality as Mutiny on the Bounty. I know that I criticize the Academy for genre snobbery, and make no mistake this is a problem we'll be lambasting them for time and again, but there ultimately is a time and place to pick battles. And, honestly, Mutiny on the Bounty is a better drama than Captain Blood is an action film. Or for that matter A Night at the Opera as a comedy. And as for movies like The Crusades or Les Misérables, which are very good, it does say a lot when Cecil B. DeMille isn’t the best historical epic of the year. Once again, Mutiny on the Bounty is a far better and more iconic film than both of them.

The only real challenge in terms of influence is Bride of Frankenstein and comparing the two is like comparing apples and oranges. And both are delicious. This is one of those cases where you cannot afford to only choose one or the other. If you enjoy old movies, I highly recommend that you watch both, they’re well worth your time. But if we must choose one, Mutiny on the Bounty is definitely a solid choice. So calling it the outstanding production was a…

SUCCESS!

Personal Favorite Movies of 1935:

• A Midsummer Night's Dream (dir. Max Reinhardt and William Dieterle)
• A Night at the Opera (dir. Sam Wood)
• Anna Karenina (dir. Clarence Brown)
• Bride of Frankenstein (dir. James Whale)
• Les Misérables (dir. Richard Boleslawski)
• Mutiny on the Bounty (dir. Frank Lloyd)
• Naughty Marietta (dir. Robert Z. Leonard and W. S. Van Dyke)
• The Crusades (dir. Cecil B. DeMille)
• The Raven (dir. Lew Landers)
• The 39 Steps (dir. Alfred Hitchcock)

Favorite Heroes:

• Jean Valjean (Fredric March) (Les Misérables)
• King Richard the Lionheart (Henry Wilcoxon) (The Crusades)
• Lieutenant Fletcher Christian (Clark Gable) (Mutiny on the Bounty)
• Midshipman Byam (Franchot Tone) (Mutiny on the Bounty)
• Tomasso and Fiorello (Harpo Marx and Chico Marx) (A Night at the Opera)

Favorite Villains:

• Captain William Bligh (Charles Laughton) (Mutiny on the Bounty)
• Frankenstein's Monster (Boris Karloff) (Bride of Frankenstein)
• Karenin (Basil Rathbone) (Anna Karenina)
• Mr. Murdstone (Basil Rathbone) (David Copperfield)
• Prince Namour de la Bonfain (Douglas Dumbrille) (Naughty Marietta)