20000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954)

User Rating:

7.2/10   

Director:

Richard Fleischer

Writers:

Jules Verne (novel)
Earl Felton (screenplay)

Release Date:

23 December 1954 (USA)

Genre:

Adventure | Drama | Family | Sci-Fi

Tagline:

Walt Disney's Mighty, Magnificent, Memorable 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea!

Plot:

A ship sent to investigate a wave of mysterious sinkings encounters the advanced submarine, the Nautilus, commanded by Captain Nemo.

Plot Keywords:

Submarine | Ocean | Captain | Captain Nemo | Atlantis

Awards:

Won 2 Oscars. Another 2 nominations

Cast

Kirk Douglas	...	Ned Land
James Mason	...	Captain Nemo
Paul Lukas	...	Prof. Pierre Arronax
Peter Lorre	...	Conseil
Robert J. Wilke	...	First Mate of the Nautilus
Ted de Corsia	...	Capt. Farragut
Carleton Young	...	John Howard
J.M. Kerrigan	...	Old Billy
Percy Helton	...	Coach Driver
Ted Cooper	...	Mate on 'Lincoln'

Also Known As:

Jules Verne's 20000 Leagues Under the Sea (USA) (complete title)
Walt Disney's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (USA) (poster title)

Runtime:

127 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

4-Track Stereo (RCA Sound Recording)

Certification:

Portugal:M/6 | Iceland:L | Finland:K-12 (1955) | Finland:K-8 (1976) | Canada:G (video rating) | New Zealand:G | Australia:PG | Canada:F (Ontario) | France:U | Norway:11 | Spain:T | Sweden:15 | UK:U | USA:Approved (PCA #17073) | Canada:G (Manitoba/Nova Scotia/Quebec) | USA:G (re-rating) (1970) | West Germany:12

Filming Locations:

20th Century Fox Studios - 10201 Pico Blvd., Century City, Los Angeles, California, USA

Company:

Walt Disney Productions

Trivia:

When the "Nautilus" rams a ship and we see how it sinks down through the water, some of the bubble-streams are animated to hide the wires that support the ship-model.

Goofs:

Factual errors: When the giant squid appears, it is swimming toward the Nautilus with its tentacles first. While squid can swim in both directions, they normally move mantle first with tentacles trailing due to much better movement through the water and their gill systems adapted to movement in this direction, particularly if they are trying to swim at a high rate of speed. Also, if the squid was moving with the tentacles in front, they would trail toward the back, not stay rigidly in front of it, like a person's arms stretched out.

Quotes:

[Boarding the Nautilus for the first time]
Professor Pierre Aronnax, narrator: There is great genius behind all this.
Conseil: Yes, and great evil. Don't forget this, this is an engine of destruction.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Viewtiful Joe (2003) (VG)

Soundtrack:

A Whale of a Tale

A parable, an exemplary sci fi story, a classic tragedy

This is by far the most literate, the most moving, and the most cinematically sophisticated film Disney has ever made. Those of the reviewers at this (IMDb) site who dismiss it as a kiddie movie, or who sneer at the special effects ("time has not been kind" to this film, one of them says; according to another, "the thrill is gone") seem simply prejudiced, rather like those who automatically deride any film that features Charlton Heston or deals with a biblical theme. It is indeed quite amazing that any special effects filmed in 1954 would continue to stack up so well. (I suppose Lucas or Spielberg could improve on the giant squid today, but so what?)

The acting is almost uniformily superb, although I seem to be in the minority in my opinion that Kirk Douglas' yo-ho-ho cliché sailor is rather wooden. (v. following paragraph) James Mason portrays Captain Nemo as a tragic hero in the classic sense, neither "byronic" nor a "mad scientist": a man so far ahead of his time that the world can only see his invention as a monster to be hunted with harpoons---and yet he is so tragically wounded by the whose malice and envy of lesser men that he has indeed become, in some ways, a monster. Paul Lucas is equally heartrending as Professor Arronax, the good-hearted bourgeois academician who truly believes that anyone can be made to "see reason" and become, in effect, a nice guy. Between these huge opposites are the robust common man of action, Ned Land ("Nemo's cracked", "I want to escape!"), the Professor's worry-wart servant, Conseil (Peter Lorre), and Nemo's equally devoted, spookily laconic First Mate (Robert J. Wilkes).

(I may as well say at the outset that to my mind the characterization of Ned Land, along with Kirk Douglas' stiff and utterly unnuanced portrayal, remains the major fault of the film. I would have liked to have seen an attempt at capturing Verne's taciturn Ned, half-mad from the tension between his enforced submarine claustrophobia and his romantic longing to once again swab a deck, reef a sail, or entrust himself to winds and currents; indeed, according to the novel's Aronnax, Ned's recitals of his adventures are worthy of a "Homer of the North". Most unfortunately, the wisecracking, womanizing Ned of the film seems to reflect Douglas' momentary screen persona more than Verne's character, since it bears so little resemblance to the latter. Also, the fact that Douglas out-bills Mason in credits and advertisements is as weird as the ubiquitous poster art in which Douglas' head is two sizes larger than Mason's.)

Leaving aside my pet peeve (i.e., Douglas), there are many Shakespearean qualities here in addition to the tragedy of Nemo. For one thing, much of the action takes place inside the characters' heads: First Arronax, Conseil and Land analyze Nemo, assaying a most dangerous attempt to ferret out his motivations. Then Nemo analyzes Aronnax who, almost in retaliation, develops his own analysis of Nemo. Then Conseil and Land analyze Aronnax analyzing Nemo. Meanwhile, the claustrophobia of the submarine boat acts on their minds like an amphetamine drug, causing the latter to function more and more frantically for good or ill.

Also like Shakespeare, the dialog (and it is wonderful dialog, grave but also lively with repartee and wordplay--just see the digest of quotes preceding these reviews!) alternates with comic relief and action scenes. As to the former, worry-wart Conseil is extremely funny, one of my favorite lines being his dismissal of Ned's message-in-a-bottle idea: "That went out with Robinson Crusoe! This is the nineteenth century!" And action scenes, as the famous fight with the giant squid, serve the same purpose as the ghosts, sword fights, etc. that the Bard provided for the groundlings---so that it is indeed "family entertainment"; people of all ages can watch this film with pleasure.

Masterfully, the film contains almost precisely the necessary updating to make the story meaningful to modern audiences. The common notion that Verne foresaw atomic power is certainly apocryphal; the Vulcania scenes are adapted from Verne's novel Facing the Flag, even if his super-nitroglycerine "Fulminator" is replaced here by nuclear fission. Nonetheless, Verne's speculations on power do make a good symbolic match with the notion of atomic energy, birthing a very credible meditation on the nineteenth century in the light of its successor. The somber and frighteningly beautiful finale causes us to wonder just at what point before 1900 this or that fateful corner was turned.