A High Wind in Jamaica

Rating:
Summary: Overlooked pirate masterpeice
Review: Ahh, after watching the widescreen of this long forgotten gem on cable, we knew that a DVD was inevitable. So this review is based on the Widescreen version shown on Fox.
This is a remarkable story of a group of children who accidentally find themselves aboard a pirate ship. This is not Disney fare - there are instances of brutality, terror, death and injustice - and an ending that is totally honest and devastating.
Beautiful locations, superb photography, gifted child actors. It goes from comedy to suspense to adventure without missing a beat. If you can overlook the awful miscasting of James Coburn, the movie is nearly perfect.

Rating:
Summary: Lost treasure of a movie
Review: Enjoyable from start to finish. The acting is superb, top notch and well above standard 60's fare. The visiuals and locales are excellent as well. Highly reccomended.

Rating:
Summary: TERRIBLE MOVIE, DON'T WASTE YOUR MONEY!
Review: I read the other favorable reviews of this movie and bought it. I was clearly misled. I have never written a review before, but after watching this terrible movie I felt it my civic duty to warn others not to buy it.

I love movies and have hundreds of DVDs. This DVD is among the worst I have ever purchased.

I generally love Anthony Quinn as an actor, like James Coburn as an actor and love pirate movies. However, this is the worst so called "pirate" movie that I have ever seen. The acting by all of the actors in this movie is appalling: it is flat and boring throughout. Every actor seems as if they are half asleep or drugged throuhgout the movie. The actors fail to convey a single spark of human emotion, drama or interest in the story.

This an instantly forgettable movie. The "plot" makes no sense and is entirely uninteresting. For example, 5 children are forciblly taken from one ship to another and kidnapped by pirates and all the while the chidren never come to the realization that anything has gone wrong or that their captors are even pirates!

Nothing interesting happens in any part of the movie. It is infinitely tiresome and boring. There is not a single sword fight, not a single cannon fired, nor a single sea battle (that is depicted anyway--one sea battle is supposedly carried on during the movie--but no part of it is shown).

Additionally, every actor in this movie remains constantly terrified of one thing or another throughout the movie. Despite the fact that the plot calls for the actors to be terrified, they sleepwalk their way through their parts failing to convey even the slightest credibility that the actors are capable of displaying any human emotion.

The movie begins with a tropical hurricane in Jamaica. During the hurricane, the house of a plantation owner is seriously damaged. Afterward the plantation owner decides to send his children on a sea journey of several thousand miles to England to live with their grandparents there--without either parent making any effort to accompany the children on such an arduous voyage. All of the children are boring snobs who are entirely unlikable. The children are elitist, obnxious, self-centered, spoiled brats throughout the movie who constantly spout doom and gloom and inflict misery and misfortune everywhere they go.

The plot has the actors stumbling from one misfortune to another and never has a redeeming moment. In the end, one of the children accidentally stabs a man to death and the pirates are all hung for it because the young girl fails to tell what truthfully happened. Defying credulity, Anthony Quinn goes to his death smiling and joking.

At the end, the children all return to their Patrician lifestyle as spolied little rich children playing at their father's plantation without another thought as to the deaths of the pirates or their previous (boring) adventure.

There is not a single memorable moment in this film. It is quite simply awful.

Don't be misled by the other favorable reviews:

DON'T WASTE YOUR MONEY OR YOUR TIME ON THIS MOVIE.




Rating:
Summary: Classic story-telling in the best English tradtion . . .
Review: It was the mid-summer of 1990-1991, here in Felix Australis. I was on the long trail from Melbourne to Adelaide, driving into the searing heat of a relentess western sun . . .

I stopped at a dusty place by the name of Horsham, the chief town in the middle of the dry, arid, and sun-scorched land of the Wimmera, in western Victoria. I went to the local modern super-market, and happened upon a small heap of discounted books. Being a reader & a book-seller by trade, I turned the stock over and, to my delight, found a hardback copy by Chatto & Windus, London, of Richard Hughes' "A High Wind In Jamaica", among other marvels . . . I had never read it in all my fifty-three years! Three cheers, I thought, for the book buyer in, what seemed to me, this most unlikely place!

Tired as I was, I read avidly into the night . . .

What a marvellous experience in imagination! What superb use of the English language! Even the heat and discomfort of the opressive summer night assisted my entry into the wonderous tropical world of the West Indies & high adventure.

Some years later, I viewed the movie on TV, staring Anthony Quinn, which I found to be an exhilarating representation of Hughes' story. However, I could not find a video anywhere and sadly, gave up the search.

How marvellous to learn that it is now available on DVD!

Full marks to the Screen-writer, the Actors, the Director & the Producer and all those involved, especially FOX! Thank you. Thank you, Thank you . . .

And thanks to Richard Hughes, that genius of English story-telling, as well as to the Editor of Chatto & Windus, way back in 1929, who had the wit to publish it!

Magic!

Rating:
Summary: Classic story-telling in the best English tradtion . . .
Review: It was the mid-summer of 1990-1991, here in Felix Australis. I was on the long trail from Melbourne to Adelaide, driving into the searing heat of a relentess western sun . . .

I stopped at a dusty place by the name of Horsham, the chief town in the middle of the dry, arid, and sun-scorched land of the Wimmera, in western Victoria. I went to the local modern super-market, and happened upon a small heap of discounted books. Being a reader & a book-seller by trade, I turned the stock over and, to my delight, found a hardback copy by Chatto & Windus, London, of Richard Hughes' "A High Wind In Jamaica", among other marvels . . . I had never read it in all my fifty-three years! Three cheers, I thought, for the book buyer in, what seemed to me, this most unlikely place!

Tired as I was, I read avidly into the night . . .

What a marvellous experience in imagination! What superb use of the English language! Even the heat and discomfort of the opressive summer night assisted my entry into the wonderous tropical world of the West Indies & high adventure.

Some years later, I viewed the movie on TV, staring Anthony Quinn, which I found to be an exhilarating representation of Hughes' story. However, I could not find a video anywhere and sadly, gave up the search.

How marvellous to learn that it is now available on DVD!

Full marks to the Screen-writer, the Actors, the Director & the Producer and all those involved, especially FOX! Thank you. Thank you, Thank you . . .

And thanks to Richard Hughes, that genius of English story-telling, as well as to the Editor of Chatto & Windus, way back in 1929, who had the wit to publish it!

Magic!

Rating:
Summary: A work of art
Review: This is a movie that I've been waiting for to be released for years! A truly wonderful piece of cinema, one of those rare examples of a classic work of literature adapted into a marvelous film. The direction by Alexandre mackendrick is near perfect; the cinematography by the much missed Douglas Slocombe is masterful - vibrant yet haunting. Most of the filming is shot deck high, as though you are seeing everything through the eyes of the children. The performances are generally top notch (with a couple of exceptions) Anthony Quinn gives his career best with a performance of such depth as the greatly troubled Pirate captain. The child actors are phenominal, particularly ten year old Deborah Baxter playing Emily, such a shame she never really did anything after. The ending is trully gut wrenching and dificult to watch. This is a movie that incites all the emotions. A rich tapestry of life and death that should leave the audience totally satisfied.

Rating:
Summary: In reply to so-called Movie Lover
Review: This is in response to the inane and utterly wittless criticism of this classic and thought provoking movie: In my opinion, you should really avoid submittning anymore reviews and continue with your over indulgance in popcorn pap! Or perhap's Learn a little about the craft of cinema - On second thoughts I wouldn't bother... doubt very much it would embrace an awful lot of Power Rangers level of material; get back to Barney the Dinosaur and do us all a favour!