Captain's Paradise

By the early 1950s, with less than a dozen films under his belt, Alec Guinness had already achieved international fame and was considered the savior of the British film industry. Movie executives in England quickly saw that the world was eager for what their country did best - eccentric comedies, of which Guinness was the undisputed master. His significant following in the U.S. was evident in Bosley Crowther's September 29, 1953 New York Times review of his newest release: "The Walking and Talking Society of Alec Guinness fans, which multiplies by the thousands every time a new Guinness film appears, is due for a rush of fresh enrollments now that The Captain's Paradise is here...a clever, charming fable of the fancies and follies of a male." The movie opens with Guinness, as Capt. Henry St. James, facing a firing squad. Through flashback, we see the reason for his predicament. St. James is the captain of a steamer ferry that shuttles back and forth between Morocco and the British colony of Gibraltar (where the film was partially shot). In each location he keeps a different wife to satisfy conflicting aspects of his connubial longings. In Gibraltar, he has a sedate British housewife who offers him the solace and solidity of domestic tranquility, while on the other side of the Straits, his sexy Moroccan wife provides the pleasures of a more hedonistic existence. All runs smoothly enough for years, much to the amazement and admiration of his first mate. The trouble begins when the Moroccan wife wants to settle down to a more tranquil home life and the British spouse begins to crave wilder nights of drinking and dancing until dawn. Alec Coppel received an Academy Award nomination for his wickedly witty motion picture story, from which he and Nicholas Phipps crafted a screenplay that gave Guinness full rein for his chameleon skills, playing a man with two very different sides and wildly different lives. It was also a chance for his two co-stars to shine. Yvonne De Carlo, who would become better known to a younger generation as Lily on the 1960s TV series The Munsters, was able to display her comic skills alongside the siren image she had established in such films as the noir thriller Criss Cross (1949) and the exotic Salome Where She Danced (1945). Celia Johnson, forever the wide-eyed, heartbroken housewife of Brief Encounter (1945), which earned her an Academy Award nomination and a New York Film Critics Circle Best Actress Award, gets to parody her image as the restrained, decent middle-class English woman by adding a touch of emerging wildness beneath the staid veneer. Johnson received a British Academy Award nomination for her work in The Captain's Paradise. It's Guinness, however, who most brought audiences into the theater on both sides of the Atlantic. One of the movie's highlights is his spicy Latin dance in a night club sequence. He had to be talked into it by director Anthony Kimmins and consented to almost a week's worth of lessons from professional dancer De Carlo, resulting in some fancy footwork from both actors. Another memorable bit is the revolving picture frame he keeps on his ship with a photo of a different wife on each side. Also featured in the cast of The Captain's Paradise is Miles Malleson, a stalwart of the British film industry who had appeared with Guinness in two of his most acclaimed comedies, Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949) and The Man in the White Suit (1951). Look for Sebastian Cabot in a small part as the Moroccan vendor Ali; he later gained fame as the portly manservant Mr. French in the American TV series Family Affair. Director: Anthony Kimmins Producer: Anthony Kimmins Screenplay: Alec Coppel & Nicholas Phipps, story by Coppel Cinematography: Edward (Ted) Scaife Editing: Gerald Turney-Smith Art Direction: Paul Sheriff Original Music: Malcolm Arnold Cast: Alec Guinness (Captain Henry St. James), Yvonne De Carlo (Nita St. James), Celia Johnson (Maud St. James), Charles Goldner (Chief Officer Ricco), Miles Malleson (Lawrence St. James). BW-94m. by Rob Nixon