Lord Jim

Lawrence of the Jungle

In the late 1800s, a gallant officer in the English merchant service (Peter O'Toole) falls prey to cowardice in a weak moment and is ousted to drift from job to job until he is inspired to help a Southeast Asian village purge a cruel general (Eli Wallach), hoping for redemption. The peripheral cast includes Paul Lukas, Jack Hawkins, Curd Jürgens, Daliah Lavi and James Mason.

Richard Brooks’ “Lord Jim” (1965) is heavily boiled-down from the superfluous prose of Joseph Conrad's 1900 novel and comes across as overly sentimental and melodramatic. The fictitious village of Patusan is located in Malaysia in the book where the population is largely Muslim while in the movie, which was made in 1964 when the Vietnam situation was escalating, Patusan is deftly moved several hundred miles north to mainland Southeast Asia where the population is Buddhist.

At its heart, this is an exploration of the negative effects of fear and the thin line between cowardice and heroism, which is reminiscent of “They Came to Cordora” (1959), but with the setting and general tone of “The Ugly American” (1963), albeit 60+ years in the past.

With O’Toole playing a character that helps a ragtag group of idealist indigenous people you can’t help but think of “Lawrence of Arabia” (1962) transferred to the jungle. But “Lord Jim” comes across awkward and boring by comparison, not to mention more old-fashioned even though it’s newer by a few years. The ending is questionably done and leaves a bad taste.

On the positive side, some elements are well done, even artistic, and clearly influenced Coppola’s outstanding “Apocalypse Now” (1979).

The movie runs 2 hours, 34 minutes, and was shot in Lantau Island, Hong Kong; Angkor Wat, Cambodia; and Malacca, Malaysia. Studio work was done at Shepperton Studios, Surrey, England.

GRADE: C

There is much of his TE Lawrence performance in Peter O'Toole's eponymous characterisation of William Conrad's 19th Century sailor. He is cashiered out of the service on grounds of cowardice after being forced to abandon some Muslim pilgrims amidst a storm at sea. Many years on, when he manages to thwart some would-be maritime saboteurs, he allies with trader "Stein" (Paul Lukas) and sets off up river to help some locals who are being enslaved by the "General" (Eli Wallach) and his drunken, cowardly pal "Cornelius" (Curd Jürgens). Battles ensue before "Jim" finds himself further embroiled in the machinations of James Mason's "Brown" on the hunt for some gold and.... Essentially this film (as was the book) is about redemption. "Jim" constantly regrets his earlier, hasty, actions and will stop at nothing to demonstrate that a coward he isn't. Richard Brooks keeps this film moving along quickly with plenty of attention to the gist (if not always the detail) of the book. The episodic nature of the narrative allows the other characters - including Jack Hawkins' "Marlow" - to play their parts for twenty or minutes or so before the plot moves on to pastures a bit new and so it is rarely dull. The production standards are high, and O'Toole, Wallach and especially Jürgens are on good form throughout. I enjoyed this.