 Nominated for three Academy Awards, Alfred Hitchcock's World War II drama, is a remarkable story of human survival. After their ship is sunk in the Atlantic by Germans, eight people are stranded in a lifeboat, among them a glamorous journalist , a tough seaman, a nurse and an injured sailor. Their problems are further compounded when they pick up a ninth passenger - the Nazi captain from the U-boat that torpedoed them. With its powerful interplay of suspense and emotion, this legendary classic is a microcosm of humanity, revealing the subtleties of man's strengths and frailties under extraordinary duress. Storyline: In the Atlantic during WWII, a ship and a German U-boat are involved in a battle and both are sunk. The survivors from the ship gather in one of the boats. They are from a variety of backgrounds: an international journalist, a rich businessman, the radio operator, a nurse, a steward, a sailor and an engineer with communist tendencies. Trouble starts when they pull a man out of the water who turns out to be from the U-boat. Written by Col Needham Cast Notes: Tallulah Bankhead (Constance 'Connie' Porter), William Bendix (Gus Smith), Walter Slezak (Willy), Mary Anderson (Alice MacKenzie), John Hodiak (John Kovac), Henry Hull (Charles D. 'Ritt' Rittenhouse), Heather Angel (Mrs. Higgins), Hume Cronyn (Stanley 'Sparks' Garrett), Canada Lee (George 'Joe' Spencer). User Comment: robert frangie frangie (robertfrangie@hotmail.com) from Mexico, 29 April 2005 • More than one director has realized that the perfect plausible way of confining your characters to provide suspense is to put them in a boat – a mini-world of people, unable to get away from each other and isolated in the vast impersonal ocean with perils of its own... The film is set in World War II… An Allied ship was sunk by a German U-boat and a mixed bunch of survivors got away in the lifeboat… The enemy submarine was also sunk by the explosion and its Nazi commander joined the survivors in their lifeboat… At first they were prepared to throw him overboard – but it was his skill which saved their little craft and gradually, while the allies were torn by dissension, selfishness, divided aims and views, his single-minded strength of purpose and his disciplined abilities took command… Unknown to the others, he was stealing their rations to keep up his strength, and directing them towards a rendez-vous with a German supply ship… Tallulah Bankhead, incidentally, dominated the acting of the whole fine cast except possibly Walter Slezak, as the Nazi… As the woman journalist, keeping close to her material possessions, and only emotionally more friendly, she gave a performance with the power and the pain of a thirty feet salt wave… It is ironic that the film's propaganda message, which I believe weakened and over-simplified it, was widely misunderstood at the time… Hitchcock intended to show at that stage of the war that the democracies should settle their differences and unite forces against the common enemy, who was disciplined, strong, and knew just where he was going… Instead, a lot of people attacked the film for showing the strongest character as the Nazi! "Lifeboat" is an interesting thriller from the mounting tensions of the interplay of conflicting characters, trapped and isolated in the planks of their little boat… Summary: The film's propaganda message was widely misunderstood at the time…. User Comment: Michael Bragg (mbragg@menlocollege.menlo.edu) from Redwood Shores,CA, 16 April 1999 • In one of Alfred Hitchcock's earliest films, six people with different personalities and backgrounds are stranded together in a lifeboat after the passenger-carrying freighter they are on is sunk by a German u-boat in the Mid-Atlantic. The cast includes the fabulous Tallulah Bankhead as a bitchy photo-journalist, Hume Cronyn as kind-hearted man who finds love on the lifeboat, Canada Lee as a kind steward, Walter Slezak as a mysterious German, and John Hodiak who has to dodge Tallulah's nonstop advances. Hitchcock did this film on one set - the single lifeboat. What's amazing is that he could keep things interesting for two hours, but he managed to somehow. Bankhead is this movie's greatest asset. Reportedly, she didn't wear underwear on the set and constantly kept the crew at attention! This is a great, novel film. Summary: I'd like to be lost at sea with this great cast anyday. Trivia:
IMDb Rating (11/12/12): 7.9/10 from 12,723 users IMDb Rating (10/22/05): 7.7/10 from 3,171 users
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