A hot air balloon takes three Union soldiers—Captain Cyrus Harding (), Corporal Neb Nugent (), and Herbert Brown (Michael Callan)—escaping from a Confederate prison camp along with news reporter Gideon Spilitt (Gary Merrill) and Confederate prisoner Sgt Pencroft (Percy Herbert) to an mysterious volcanic island in the South Pacific where they encounter giant animals, such as crabs, birds, and bees. In their attempts to escape, they encounter the legendary Captain Nemo (Herbert Lom) and his infamous submarine, the Nautilus.
Mysterious Island is based on L'Île mystérieuse ([The Mysterious Island) (1874), a science fiction novel by French writer Jules Verne [1828-1905]. The novel was adapted for this movie by John Prebble, Daniel B. Ullman, and Crane Wilbur. The story was remade for TV as Mysterious Island (2005) in 2005.
Captain Nemo was introduced in an earlier science fiction novel, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1870), also written by Jules Verne. In this story, Nemo is portrayed as a solitary commander who secretly built an electrically-powered submarine, the Nautilus, which he uses to circle the globe in his quest for scientific knowledge and revenge on civilization. (In the movie, Nemo's revenge is directed more towards war vessels.) At the end of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Nemo, the Nautilus, and its crew are caught in a whirlpool off the coast of Norway (in the movie, the Nautilus disappeared off the coast of Mexico), and his fate is left a mystery. In the novel Mysterious Island, it is further revealed that Captain Nemo was an East Indian who took to the sea after his family was killed during the Indian Rebellion against the British in 1857. However, in Verne's original version of the novel, Nemo was supposedly portrayed as a Polish nobleman whose family was murdered by Russians during the Polish January Uprising of 1863. Verne's publisher is credited with persuading him to make this change for political reasons.
Captain Harding decided to climb to the top of a mountain in order to get a view of the island, to see if there was evidence of habitation or a way to get off the island. Along the way, they encounter a herd of goats, so they lasso a few for their meat and milk. Later, they build a corral in which to keep them.
Not more than a few days after their balloon lands on this mysterious, uncharted island that shows no evidence of human habitation, the five men are surprised (pleasantly) when a small skiff floats onto the beach, revealing the bodies of a man and two good-looking women. The man is dead, but the women turn out to be Lady Mary Fairchild (Joan Greenwood) and her niece Elena Fairchild (Beth Rogan). Lady Mary explains that they were on their way home to Marseilles, France from Valparaiso, Chile when their ship went down.
With the aid of a map and a sextant, Captain Harding is able to calculate their location at 35° S latitude and 153° W longitude, which places them in the Pacific Ocean just under 1,900 miles east of New Zealand.
Captain Nemo disliked being around other people, so when the men first landed on the island, he kept his distance, aiding them only by pulling Captain Harding ashore and then building a signal fire, which the others chalked it up to Harding forgetting that he built a fire just before he passed out. Later, as Nemo watched the five men and two women set up their shelter, hunt, and defend themselves, he aided them by "sending" them a chest filled with helpful items like maps, matches, rifles, cookware, and a sextant. Finally, he revealed himself when he decided that they were resourceful enough to be of use to him. The Nautilus was incapable of going to sea again, and one of the volcanoes on the island was about to blow. Nemo needed their help to get his scientific equipment and data off the island.
They prepare to patch and raise the sunken pirate ship in order to get off the island, but the volcano begins to erupt sooner than planned. Nemo gives up hope and takes refuge in the Nautilus. Captain Harding comes up with the idea of filling the inside of the pirate ship with the balloon in which they arrived on the island. Then, they can pump air through the bamboo pipeline into the ship causing it to float to the surface. Nemo thinks that it just might work. While the men do the work, Nemo loads up his scientific equipment and stays behind to work the air pumps in the Nautilus. It works, and soon the pirate ship is afloat. Before they can get back for Nemo, however, the volcano goes wild, and the island cracks apart. As the pirate ship sails away, Captain Harding can be heard saying that, when they get back to civilization, they will pledge their lives to working for a peaceful and bountiful world, as Captain Nemo would have liked it.
Yes. Mysterious Island's copyright expired long ago, and Project Gutenberg has made the text to Mysterious Island available for downloading.
Those who have both seen the movie and read the novel almost unanimously decry the fact that the movie has "butchered" the story as Jules Verne wrote it. For example, the novel has no giant crabs, giant bees, or giant monsters of any kind. Verne's novel also has no shipwrecked women serving as housekeepers and love interests. Just these two additions, which make up a large amount of the movie's storyline, have changed the character of the story.
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- How long is Mysterious Island?1 hour and 41 minutes
- When was Mysterious Island released?December 20, 1961
- What is the IMDb rating of Mysterious Island?6.7 out of 10
- Who stars in Mysterious Island?
- Who wrote Mysterious Island?
- Who directed Mysterious Island?
- Who was the composer for Mysterious Island?
- Who was the producer of Mysterious Island?
- Who was the cinematographer for Mysterious Island?
- Who was the editor of Mysterious Island?
- Who are the characters in Mysterious Island?Capt. Cyrus Harding, Herbert Brown, Gédéon Spilett, Captain Nemo, and Cpl. Neb Nugent
- What is the plot of Mysterious Island?During the Civil War a group of Union soldiers and two Confederates escape the stockade using a hot-air balloon and end up on a strange Pacific island.
- What was the budget for Mysterious Island?$2 million
- What is Mysterious Island rated?Not Rated
- What genre is Mysterious Island?Adventure, Fantasy, and Sci-Fi
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