Across the Pacific (1942)

User Rating:

6.8/10   

Director:

John Huston

Writers:

Richard Macaulay (screenplay)
Robert Carson (serial)

Release Date:

5 September 1942 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Adventure | Drama | Romance | War

Plot:

Rick Leland makes no secret of the fact he has no loyalty to his home country after he is court-marshaled...

Plot Keywords:

Panama | Japanese | Passenger | Panama Canal | Saboteur

Cast

Humphrey Bogart	...	Rick Leland
Mary Astor	...	Alberta Marlow
Sydney Greenstreet	...	Dr. Lorenz
Charles Halton	...	A.V. Smith
Victor Sen Yung	...	Joe Totsuiko (as Sen Young)
Roland Got	...	Sugi
Lee Tung Foo	...	Sam Wing On
Frank Wilcox	...	Captain Morrison
Paul Stanton	...	Colonel Hart
Lester Matthews	...	Canadian Major
John Hamilton	...	Court-Martial President
Tom Stevenson	...	Unidentified Man
Roland Drew	...	Captain Harkness
Monte Blue	...	Dan Morton
Chester Gan	...	Captain Higoto

Also Known As:

Aloha Means Goodbye (USA) (working title)

Runtime:

97 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English | Japanese

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Sound System)

Certification:

Argentina:Atp | Australia:G | Canada:G (video rating) | Finland:K-16 | Sweden:15 | USA:Approved (PCA #8248)

Company:

Warner Bros. Pictures

Trivia:

The last-minute screenplay change from Pearl Harbor to the Panama Canal was not implausible. Until the mid 1930s US military exercises concentrated on defending the Panama Canal from air, amphibious & small craft attack and were extensively covered by the press.

Goofs:

Factual errors: The background for the opening titles is a map of the Panama Canal. The orientation of the map and the compass is correct, but the labeling of the map is incorrect. In fact, the Atlantic end of the canal and the city of Colon are at the upper left (Northwest), and the Pacific end of the canal and Panama City are at the lower right (Southeast). The map is correctly labeled behind the closing credits.

Quotes:

Rick Leland: When you're slapped, you're gonna take it and like it.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Play It Again, Sam (1972)

Good Intentions, Perhaps, But It Didn't Deliver

Here's one Humphrey Bogart movie that didn't click, and this is after he became a big star. It's also a similar cast and director from the previous year's hit film, "The Maltese Falcon," but a good cast doesn't guarantee a good movie. The same hold true for director John Huston. Maybe these people were just doing their duties as patriotic Americans by starring in a World War II movie to boost the home front during the war. I applaud them, if that's the case. However, this is no award-winner. Bogart's character, "Rick Leland," was not a guy I could get involved with caring about and that helped make me lose interest in the film.

Myrna Loy didn't help, either. How anyone could call her "glamorous" is beyond me. Her face, with the exaggerated eye shadow makeup, was disgusting in this film. After awhile, I couldn't look at her.

Having it set in the wrong ocean didn't help, either. I mean, come on - you only have two big oceans on either side of the U.S. and you get the wrong one in the story? What were they thinking? The setting takes place in the Atlantic, not the Pacific.Maybe, like today, Hollywood thought the whole world revolved around its neck of the woods.

There are too many hokey things in here, like people getting knocked off a second before they are going to divulge information. That happened more than once. In fact, how often has that ploy been used over the years?

Outside of the patriotic effort, which should be made more these days, the only positive of this film was the nice black-and-white photography.