Botany Bay (1953)

User Rating:

5.7/10   

Director:

John Farrow

Writers:

James Norman Hall (novel)
Jonathan Latimer (writer)

Release Date:

7 October 1953 (USA)

Genre:

Adventure | Drama | Romance

Tagline:

SAVAGE as the Great Continent They Invaded!

Plot:

In 1787 prisoners from London's Newgate Gaol are to be shipped to New South Wales. Hugh Tallant is an American medical student whom...

Plot Keywords:

Medical Student | Ship | Bare Chested Male Bondage | Australian Aboriginal | Miscarriage Of Justice

Cast

Alan Ladd	...	Hugh Tallant
James Mason	...	Capt. Paul Gilbert
Patricia Medina	...	Sally Munroe
Cedric Hardwicke	...	Gov. Phillip (as Sir Cedric Hardwicke)
Murray Matheson	...	Rev. Mortimer Thynne
Dorothy Patten	...	Mrs. Nellie Garth
John Hardy	...	Nat Garth
Hugh Pryse	...	Ned Inching
Malcolm Lee Beggs	...	Nick Sabb
Anita Sharp-Bolster	...	Moll Cudlip (as Anita Bolster)
Jonathan Harris	...	Tom Oakly
Alec Harford	...	Brig-keeper Jenkins
Noel Drayton	...	Second Mate Spencer
Branden Toomey	...	Guard
Ben Wright	...	Deck Officer Green

Runtime:

93 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Recording)

Certification:

Finland:K-16 | USA:Approved (PCA #15867) | Sweden:15

Company:

Paramount Pictures

Trivia:

According to his biography, Alan Ladd summed up his role in "Botany Bay" as follows: "I'm a hell of a hero in this picture. I kill nine guys and duel and talk and talk and talk and make love all over the place. Don't miss me. I'm very big."

Quotes:

Capt. Paul Gilbert: Mr. Green, you will make preparations for keelhauling the prisoners.
Second Mate Spencer: Captain Gilbert, no man has been keelhauled on an English ship for fifty years.
Capt. Paul Gilbert: Oh, I don't think it's been that long.

Still haunted by Mason's villainy!

As of this date, the only other IMDb comment on this title is one with which I can agree. I saw it during its neighborhood run in the year of its release and recall that it did, indeed, look like the budget must have been rather minuscule. But James Mason's performance is one that I can still remember as entirely disturbing for a young moviegoer not yet in his teens. What an actor! He made this film, which Paramount obviously treated as just a programmer, quite an experience. If remade today, I suppose we'd have Mel Gibson in the Alan Ladd role and, perhaps, Geoffrey Rush trying to imitate Mason's indelible portrait, plus some authentic Australian locations. But once was enough, for it was quite a grim experience, and the brutality that would probably be gruesomely depicted today would be more than I'd pay to see!