The Sea Wolf (1941)

Director:

Michael Curtiz

Writers:

Jack London (novel)
Robert Rossen (writer)

Release Date:

21 March 1941 (USA)

Genre:

Drama | Adventure

Plot:

Humphrey van Weyden, a writer, and fugitives Ruth Webster and George Leach have been given refuge aboard...

Plot Keywords:

Blood Transfusion | Fugitive | Gunshot Wound | Insanity | Murder

Awards:

Nominated for Oscar.

Cast

Edward G. Robinson	...	'Wolf' Larsen
Ida Lupino	...	Ruth Webster
John Garfield	...	George Leach
Alexander Knox	...	Humphrey Van Weyden
Gene Lockhart	...	Dr. Prescott
Barry Fitzgerald	...	Cooky
Stanley Ridges	...	Johnson
David Bruce	...	Young Sailor
Francis McDonald	...	Svenson
Howard Da Silva	...	Harrison
Frank Lackteen	...	Smoke

Runtime:

87 min (edited version) (TCM print) | 100 min (original version) | USA:90 min (video version)

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Colour:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Sound System)

Certification:

Australia:G | Finland:K-16 | Portugal:M/12 (re-release: 2000) | Sweden:15 | USA:Approved (PCA #6866)

Company:

Warner Bros. Pictures

Trivia:

Seventy-five carpenters were used to build the Ghost.

Quotes:

Humphrey Van Weyden: There's a price no man will pay for living.

Movie Connections:

Featured in Between Two Worlds: Erich Wolfgang Korngold (2001) (TV)

Soundtrack:

Rosie (You Are My Posie)

Plot Overboard!

Jack London led a life easily as interesting as most of his characters. Started out as an oyster pirate near Oakland, then a writer, journalist, and socialist in -- well, all over the place, London, Alaska, the Orient, and back to the artists' colony in Carmel, California, before it became unaffordable for everyone but cosmetic surgeons, then alcoholism, and heroin addiction, before winding up in a mountain hideaway near Napa. His socialist tracts are forgotten; his short stories survive in high-school compendia, but his best-known novel is probably "The Sea Wolf." (Unless you favor dogs.)

The opening of the novel is unforgettable for anyone who has crossed from the City to Sausalito on the ferry through the fog. The collision that sinks the ferry and puts Humphrey Van Weiden aboard the Ghost is supposed to take place, I think, in 1904, but it could have happened yesterday. London has that opening down pat. And not just the opening. The San Francisco waterfront at the time was filled with Scandinavian skippers -- a repetitive slew of Larsons and Carsons -- so much so that each had to be given a nickname so he could be distinguished from the others. What nicknames! Red Dog Carlson is one that comes to mind. And Wolf Larsen is London's most famous character, for good reason. The book's Wolf Larson doesn't look much like E. G. Robinson, though. The novel's Larson is tall, blonde, and deeply tanned, except that when he removes his clothing he's revealed as white all over except for his weather skin, and he bulges with muscles. He calls Humphrey "Hump," a nice touch. Robinson is actually quite good in the role. He can be domineering and nasty when it's called for. And he's one of those guys who quotes Dante and has copies of Nietzsche and other eggheads stashed below in his cabin. Alexander Knox is fine as "Hump." But London befouled his novel with a love story that simply does not belong in the narrative. And, worse, his prose gets all mawky and purple as Hump falls in love with a girl they pick up. The movie pretty much keeps the captain's character intact as well as the general story line of Hump's brutal socialization, but the romance which is a blemish in the novel is blown up in the movie until it is an integral part of the plot from the very beginning. Characters such as Leach, the very recognizable John Garfield of the 1940s, are added for box office punch and maybe as compensation for Knox's more effete qualities. It's a good story, a very good story, and hardly needed the embellishments of the Hollywood hacks who worked it over. Still, the movie is well worth seeing. There are several other versions of the tale. I think I've seen two of them and neither is as good as this one. Jack London was never a great novelist. He died young but it's doubtful that he would have produced much more of value.

But at least two of his adventure tales -- "Call of the Wild" and "The Sea Wolf" -- are accurate reflections of particular points in place and time. They're sort of embedded in our literary history, and they deserve to be. Maybe some teenager will watch this movie out of boredom and, when it's over, think, "Hey, there's a lot of action in this! Maybe I ought to get that book out of the library and READ it." Can you imagine a teenager being stimulated enough to read a book?