Re: The S&A Films


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Posted by Mike Dennis on September 02, 2006 at 10:25:56 from 84.68.76.250 user MTD.

In Reply to: The S&A Films posted by Jenny Berki on September 02, 2006 at 00:33:23:

How fortuitous - I have been away on holiday this week and took the chance to watch the film on the new DVD release for the first time in years. My overall impression is that I have miss-judged it, and as time has gone on my memory of it has made it worse than I thought!
Yes, there is miscasting - John is younger in all ways than Susan; Roger comes across as almost retarded. Ronald Fraser as Captain Flint, well he does his best but to be honest no actor of the time comes to mind that would give the production company a 'star' name. On a previous thread someone commented that Nancy was 'posh', well you have to admit that the family was at least upper-middle-class - remember the scene where she arrives on the island to tell of the policeman for questioning John? How many children in the 1930s where in a position to do such a thing?
Yes, the plot has been simplified. But until recent times with the like of the Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter films this was the 'norm' with film adaptation.
What I had forgotten was the obvious effort the director made to capture the period and to emulate AR's illustrations in film - for example the leaving for the island scene with mother etc waving goodbye.
The sailing scenes are good, if only because you can see that the children involved are actually sailing - not cutaway shots to give an impression. The visit to the charcoal burners is well done, this could have been simplified to the children passing them in a lane and getting the message for Captain Flint that way; but the director as recreated the scene as in the book.
Overall it is a fair attempt at filming something where, as is always the case, every reader as an idea of what it should look like.
I remember the TV adaptation from childhood, and now having seen the film again remember thinking on its release what an improvement!


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