The Sea Wolf

CinemaSerf

This is a sort of briny equivalent of out of the frying pan and into the fire, as "Leach" (John Garfield), "Ruth" (Ida Lupino) and "Van Weyden" (Alexander Knox) find themselves unwilling passengers on a schooner. It's skipper "Larsen" (Edward G. Robinson) must have gone to the William Bligh school of seamanship as he rules his vessel with a ruthless rod of iron. What begins to puzzle our reluctant passengers is just what the ship's mission is and why their host refuses to drop them off at any port but, eventually, at their home of San Francisco. As that mystery deepens, we become immersed in a darkly characterful study of a bully and of the shrewd tactics he uses to keep control amongst a crew of men who would as readily keel haul a colleague as rescue him. There's a slightly romantic element from Lupino and Leach but rather than dominate the proceedings, this actually serves to introduce an extra layer of menace as the captain finds yet another tool to use to manipulate his new quarry. Robinson is on super form here. On the face of it, he's just a gnarly brute but as the plot thickness up nicely we start to see a little more of the man and of what drove any humanity he ever had from him - and question the role of his absent but omnipresent brother in all of this. Knox also delivers powerfully here as the more cultured character whose nature is entirely ill-fitted for any life on the sea that doesn't involve an ocean liner and some champagne and so is going to have the toughest time trying to adapt, and Lupino offers quite a solid portrayal of a woman who is anything but the screeching damsel in distress. The photography is dark and grainy, Korngold's score and the remarkably convincing visual effects of a torrid life at sea all contribute to craft a nasty seafaring drama in which Robinson shines. Not quite Charles Laughton, but nearly...!