Thunder Rock (1942) User Reviews

Strongly imaginative, very well acted and presented...

[Nazi_Fighter_David · 8/10 · 10 September 2000]

In England, Michael Powell's "49th Parallel" and Leslie Howard's "Pimpernel Smith" are effective statements about the fight against Nazism...

In "Thunder Rock," adapted from a play by Robert Audrey, an anti-fascist journalist in Canada (Michael Redgrave) fails in his political movement because of the greed and avarice of his Fleet Street fellow workers and the self-satisfaction of the public...

He retires to an isolated lighthouse on lake Michigan, in disgust with the world of the thirties...

The lighthouse rock sustains a commemorative tablet to a group of European immigrants whose ship sank off-shore during a storm a century before...

As the weeks turn into months, the professional writer begins to imagine the ghosts of the dead names appearing before him, each telling their tale of sorrow, of escaping, of seeking a new life...

In the end he decides he has no cause to complain, and that it is his duty to keep on fighting, even if only for the sake of the dead he has conjured up...

The film (photographed in black and white) is intriguing, strongly imaginative, very well acted and presented...

Fascinating film with a message for the world

[blanche-2 · 8/10 · 28 July 2009]

Based on a play, "Thunder Rock" is a 1942 film that follows the fascination with ghosts that seems prevalent at the time, just as it is prevalent in ours. There was "Between Two Worlds," which was the remake of "Outward Bound," "The Ghost and Mrs. Muir," "Heaven Can Wait," "Here Comes Mr. Jordan," - etc.! I won't go into the angels - "It's a Wonderful Life," "The Bishop's Wife," etc. The war caused people to think about death and the afterlife a great deal.

"Thunder Rock" is about a newspaperman David Charleston, (Michael Redgrave) who saw the rise of Fascism and Nazism and tried to warn people to wake up and take action. Unfortunately, his editors wouldn't allow the doom and gloom. His response is to give up and take a job as a lighthouse keeper on Thunder Rock in Lake Michigan. There, he becomes interested in a ship's log of a ship that went down 90 years earlier. He begins to have conversations with them in his mind. None of the passengers know they're dead except for the captain (Finlay Currie). He shows David how each of these people came to be on the ship. There's a doctor driven out of Vienna for using an early form of anesthesia (Frederick Valk), an early feminist (Beverly Mullen) jailed repeatedly for her views, a man and his wife en route to America to try for a better life for their family.

There are several themes present in this film - the themes of keeping hope, not giving up one's quest, and affirming life, certainly important ideas in a time of war. There's also the theme of reincarnation, as one of these people could have been Charleston. In the beginning of the film, there is the communication of information from one person to another to another to another, as knowledge is passed through generations.

Redgrave is excellent, as are Finlay Currie, Beverly Mullen, James Mason (as David's friend) and a young Lili Palmer as the doctor's daughter. In fact, the whole cast is good, including a young Barry Morse in his pre-"The Fugitive" days, as the ex-fiancée of Beverly Mullen.

Beautifully photographed and thought-provoking.

being a war correspondent means you'll see ghosts

[becky-bradway · 7/10 · 6 September 2015]

Holy sh*t, was this a peculiar movie! Slow moving but oddly compelling look at a writer's psyche. A war correspondent desperately wants to awaken Britain's awareness of fascism and the inevitable war and dismally fails -- and this is all shown in flashback. The correspondent is shown as an isolated fellow in a lighthouse on the Great Lakes, post-war, who becomes obsessed with the story of drowned immigrants who never reach the lighthouse a hundred years before (get the connection?), dying at sea. And the story then becomes what he imagines their lives to have been, growing in complexity and realism as he comes to terms with his own defeats. I've never seen the writing process so accurately shown in a film as he talks to the characters in his mind and continues to revise their lives before our eyes. An ambitious film that doesn't entirely work, but that I found fascinating and moving. Michael Redgrave is terrific, too, and James Mason, who appears too briefly, has a really cute wave in his hair (ha).

One of the most impressive movies I've ever experienced!

[ShoPea · 5 June 2002]

I saw Thunder Rock as a student in Toronto (Canada)when it came out in about 1942. Thought the plot has faded somewhat in my memory, the acting, the allegorical inferences and the very remarkable optical distortions that said far more than words--all of these have stayed with me for the sixty years since that time.

I'd love to see it revived for viewing.

A Film with Deep Meanings

[whpratt1 · 7/10 · 27 January 2008]

Enjoyed this film from 1942 which I have never seen over the years and it captured my attention from the beginning to the very end. It concerns an anti-fascist journalist named David Charleston, (Michael Redgrave) who is a reporter for a newspaper in Canada and he has traveled in Europe and has discovered that Hitler is starting trouble in Germany and there is reason to believe that Japan is also starting problems in China. David has great insight and tries to tell the English people about the threat of Hitler's Germany and to prepare for war in the early 1930's. David writes many books trying to tell the world that they are in big trouble and then decides to retire to a lighthouse in Michigan on the Great Lakes. A good friend of David, named Streeter, (James Mason) visits David at the lighthouse and wants to find out why David never cashes his pay checks for months. Streeter gets upset with the way that David is acting and finds out that he is communicating with dead people that had a shipwreck ninety years ago in the great lakes and in his own mind they are alive and talking to him. These people were European immigrants who wanted to come to America and at the lighthouse there is a Commemorative Tablet speaking about this shipwrecked crew members. This is a very deep and wonderful film with a great story to tell.

Overlong but some good moments

[Malc-13 · 7/10 · 6 August 2001]

That this story is an allegory is clear from very early on but the director seems to have wanted to disguise it somehow with unnecessary padding. In doing so he detracts from the overall message and loses his audience a little along the way. Take the opening scenes as an example where a phone call is passed higher and higher through a chain of employees. It's well played, well acted and amusing and of absolutely no relevence whatsoever to the plot. You may as well have had a Donald Duck Cartoon instead and started the film where James Mason lands at the lighthouse.

It achieves some great moments both in and out of it's lighthouse setting, Michael Redgrave is very good but everything just goes on that little bit too long for it's own good.

James Mason stardom puts him near the top of the billing, but he's really only a bit player in this and doesn't make any significant contribution to the overall film.

Intriguing psychological fantasy with lighthouse setting...

[Doylenf · 6/10 · 26 January 2008]

The 1940s was certainly the decade where Hollywood was producing many films with psychological overtones (everything from SPELLBOUND to POSSESSED to THE SNAKE PIT), so it comes as no surprise that Britain was also delving into stories where such elements were found in some of the prominent British films of that decade--films like BLACK NARCISSUS where madness overtakes a woman's mind and leads to attempted murder. Here, it's the supernatural that takes center stage.

THUNDER ROCK has an intriguing premise and deals more with the supernatural and the effect that the ghostly inhabitants of a lighthouse have on the mind of a disillusioned war correspondent during the WWII era. MICHAEL REDGRAVE is the writer who retreats to a lighthouse in Lake Michigan when he wearies of a world drifting toward fascism and loss of freedom as the Nazi menace increases. His books and speeches meet with indifference by an uncaring public. The inhabitants of the lighthouse (from an 1849 shipwreck) inspire him to have courage and go on with his life and fight for his beliefs.

Unfortunately, the allegorical fable of a man visited by the spirits of dead passengers who lost their lives at sea doesn't ring true. The heavy handed treatment of a delicate theme doesn't help. In short, the story never reaches the kind of potential it had--and despite good acting by the entire cast, especially by a young MICHAEL REDGRAVE and JAMES MASON. LILLI PALMER has little to do in a minor role but look worried and decorative.

Should have been a memorable film, but the tale is not smoothly told. Instead, it's both overlong and uneven, falling far short of the mark. Perhaps it worked better as a play or novel, but the screen version is too diffuse, overlong and preachy to make a lasting impression.

Trivia note: In overall concept, the story is reminiscent of the play "Outward Bound" which was filmed in the '30s and remade in the '40s as BETWEEN TWO WORLDS, a more successful allegory/fantasy.

An exceptionally weird but very watchable propaganda film from WWII

[planktonrules · 7/10 · 28 January 2008]

This was one weird film....and I mean REALLY, REALLY weird! Yet, despite being so weird as well as being such an obvious propaganda piece, it is still very watchable today. Plus, I know that when the original play and this movie debuted in Britain, they were extremely successful, so it was obviously an important film for the morale of the British people.

The film begins with a whole lot of obviously British actors trying to fake American accents and doing a terrible job--so badly that it made me laugh to think that the British saw us that way and I now wonder if Americans doing British accents sound that bad to the Brits (I assume we must). Oddly, some of the actors (such as the very English James Mason) didn't even attempt accents and I wonder how many people noticed this at the time. I'm sure American audiences would have noticed. This is not a major problem, but it sure was noticeable.

The story is about a disenchanted newspaper reporter (Michael Redgrave). Well before the war, he traveled the globe documenting all the signs that a war was approaching. However, despite the rise of militarism in Japan, Italy and Germany, the people at home were sick of war following the last one and just didn't want to listen (which was definitely true). So, when the war finally arrived, Redgrave left the UK and moved to the most isolated place he could find--a lonely lighthouse on a tiny island in the Great Lakes. However, and here's the really weird part, he wasn't alone as the ghost-like memories of the victims of a shipwreck near the lighthouse were his constant companions! No books, no TV and no radio--just him and his imaginary dead friends!

The most exciting and wonderful actor among these dead imaginary friends was the Captain, played by Finlay Currie--a wonderful actor you might have seen in IVANHOE, WHISKY GALORE! or BEN HUR. While his name is NOT well-known, this very prolific and exceptional actor really made an impossibly silly plot come to life. Currie and Redgrave both introduce several of the dead passengers from the long-lost ship (from 1849) and both had their own unique perspective. Redgrave imagined their deaths to be both meaningless and bigger than life, while Currie showed that all these people were running from something--something bigger than them--just like Redgrave. By the end of the film, Currie (who was imaginary) convinced Redgrave to stop being a hermit and do his part for the war effort against Fascism--a not especially subtle but very rousing ending indeed! Good acting made this silly stage production come to life. A very interesting yet preachy film from WWII.

A powerful propaganda film--on our side!

[albertsanders · 10/10 · 2 June 2007]

I saw this movie in 1942, when I worked for the War Department and had just enlisted in the Army Air Corps, so this might account for the strong memories I have of it.

I was a little shocked that it seemed almost pure propaganda. However, it was clearly made for a British audience at a time when the nation was in imminent danger of invasion by the Nazis. Its message was never to give up hope.

It opens with the hero being frightened by the spread of Fascism across Europe. He goes into a London movie house where the depressing newsreel is followed by a cartoon which the unthinking audience finds hilarious. Disgusted, he gives up and withdraws into himself. He becomes a sort of hermit and somehow gets a job as a lighthouse-keeper on the Great Lakes.

Browsing through the lighthouse's log, he finds an account of a shipwreck. As he reads, the viewer notices that the lighthouse's central pole is now at an angle--a very clever hint of the transition to the fantasy now taking place. He is now on board the sinking ship and all is confusion and despair. But it turns out OK--the first example of the message (to the English) not to give up hope.

There are several other such episodes including one about the doctor in Vienna who discovers that doctors not washing their hands is how the deadly childbirth fever infection is spread. A failure, he is laughed out of town. But a few years later his radical theory is proved correct. Another morale boost for the discouraged wartime English.

I can't remember how the movie ends--but I've never forgotten the movie!

Thunder Rock

[henry8-3 · 6/10 · 26 August 2018]

Redgrave plays a journalist lively in isolation, managing a lighthouse on Lake Michigan in despair at his inability to persuade people about the dangers of the rise in fascism. He interacts with long dead victims from a past shipwreck who escaped to America - running from their own issues.

Very strange but absorbing melodrama with mostly fine performance all around particularly from Redgrave and Mason. A real oddity.

It quietly thunders with 'importance' and prestige...

[moonspinner55 · 4/10 · 15 May 2009]

Early film from Britain's Boulting brothers (producer John and director Roy) shows an uncanny grasp of technical assurance, yet their combined talents, and those of the sterling cast, cannot eradicate the stultified air of theatricality which comes via this material, taken from the play by Robert Ardrey. Anti-fascist journalist in England, upset over the hypocrisy of the newspaper business and the silencing of free speech, takes a job at a lonesome lighthouse in Lake Michigan; his superiors question his need for complete isolation, though he confesses he's not alone. Seems the ghosts of a one hundred-year-old shipwreck reenact their lives for the lighthouse keeper, all in an attempt to bring him back to civilization. Portends to be a heady mix of political strife and the human condition, however the central character's history is much more interesting than those who were aboard the ill-fated ship, and activity in the main set (the lighthouse) becomes tiresomely stagy. One professional critic compared the film to "Citizen Kane"; however, while it is polished and professionally assembled (and moodily photographed), the falseness of the picture's conception keeps the fantastic aspects firmly grounded. ** from ****

THUNDER ROCK (Roy Boulting, 1942) ***1/2

[Bunuel1976 · 9/10 · 2 September 2006]

I had always wanted to watch this in view of its fantasy elements; I knew of the bare-bones R2 DVD but, considering the variable quality of prints available for old (and rare) British films, I was on the fence about purchasing it - the favorable DVD Beaver review, then, proved the deciding factor.

Given the little information there is about the film, I didn't quite know what to expect: as it turned out, the propagandist elements are as much to the fore but it's really the various human dramas contained within that are its most compelling aspect. Michael Redgrave (in one of his best roles) is the lone lighthouse keeper who was once a spokesman against the onslaught of Fascism (shown in a sequence of montages that clearly bear the influence of CITIZEN KANE [1941]), who has retired from the world when his warnings were dismissed. He's able to withstand his remote existence by imagining how the passengers of a ship who drowned 90 years earlier near the titular location lived!; these events are then enacted for us and, with the help of ship's captain Finlay Currie 'acting' as mediator, he's able to communicate with them!!

This concept was not only very original but also rather cerebral (especially for the time) and is certainly its most intriguing trait; interestingly, all the passengers, like Redgrave himself, seem to be escaping from the intolerance of their own era! The life-stories of the individual passengers (though, for obvious reasons of time constraint, the writers opted to focus on only three) are all somewhat melodramatic but the one involving progressive doctor Frederick Valk and Lili Palmer (who even has feelings for Redgrave, i.e. he imagines she has!) is the most engaging.

The plot and setting allowed the director and cameraman (Max Greene, who later shot Jules Dassin's British-made noir NIGHT AND THE CITY [1950]) to experiment with light and shadow which, along with the literary dialogue (it was adapted from a play by Robert Ardrey that was intended to urge America into World War II, which had already happened by the time the film came out!) and the marvelous ensemble acting, emerges as one of the film's most impressive qualities. As a matter of fact, the cast was made up of established, upcoming and (to me) unfamiliar names but, apart from the ones already mentioned, James Mason's all-too brief appearance as Redgrave's sparring pal - who has no qualms about doing his thing for the war effort - is especially notable.

The climax, too, is terrific: first, we have the 'ghosts' realizing what has really happened to them (shades of "Outward Bound" but also looking forward to THE SIXTH SENSE [1999]) and, then, their refusal to 'leave' unless Redgrave goes back to civilization and do his duty (his being dominated by entities he's supposed to be controlling himself, interestingly enough, foreshadows his unforgettable turn as the Ventriloquist in the celebrated horror compendium DEAD OF NIGHT [1945] - which, incidentally, also featured Valk as a doomed doctor!).

The Boulting Brothers - John produced the film while his twin brother Roy directed it, but they often exchanged roles! - always liked to tackle topical subjects and, though they later concentrated on satires, their sober earlier efforts were no less effective as clearly demonstrated by this neglected gem but also the noir about the British underworld BRIGHTON ROCK (1947) and the semi-documentary anti-Nuclear tale SEVEN DAYS TO NOON (1950).

Making Imaginary Friends

[bkoganbing · 7/10 · 14 May 2010]

Thunder Rock is the place where a jaded idealist played by Michael Redgrave has assigned himself in the true keepers of the lighthouse tradition. A curious place also he's put himself, miles away from the war he saw coming, on an island in the middle of Lake Michigan in the USA.

There's a plaque on the wall of lighthouse which commemorates the sinking of a packet steamer Land of Lakes during a storm on the lake with all hands lost in 1849. To pass away the lonely hours at the lighthouse, Redgrave has recreated several of the deceased passengers as characters whom he converses with. Only the ship's captain Finlay Currie knows he's dead, the others just think they're stranded on his island waiting for a storm to clear.

Redgrave's come to a personal crisis of sorts, the supervisors want him to take some overdue leave. The leave policy is there so people don't start making imaginary friends like because that's usually a ticket to the rubber room. And there's the real crisis of the oncoming World War which Redgrave tried to tell an uncaring public and its leaders about and now he's withdrawn into being the ultimate isolationist.

On the night that the action of this play takes place, Redgrave's imaginary friends start giving some unexpected answers to questions and not something that his own mind creations would give out with. The ghosts if indeed that's what they were learn their fate and Redgrave learns his responsibility. And it's not on Thunder Rock.

The play was put on by the Group Theater on Broadway in 1939 when the war was just beginning and it ran only 23 performances. The film added quite a bit to get it out of the living room of the lighthouse where all the action takes place on stage. Redgrave who made sensitive and principled characters a specialty in his career gives one of his best performances in Thunder Rock. James Mason is also in this film playing a real friend of Redgrave's who starts wondering about his sanity when Redgrave tells him about his imaginary group of dead friends off the Land of Lakes. The characters are deeply etched to make up for a rather static lack of plot.

A British film set in Lake Michigan, who'd have believed it and also believed it was good.

Worthy but Dull

[jromanbaker · 4/10 · 2 December 2022]

I am going against the grain of many reviewers here, but I have to admit this is one of the dullest, most ponderous films I have seen. That half of the film dealt with the dead taking their pulses and breathing through their lungs and that this was all coming out of Michael Redgrave's static but worthy performance, plus his mind became for me increasingly tedious and unbelievable. I believe in the sentiment conveyed that we should not abandon our convictions and courage in times of adversity and war, and I see that as being blatantly obvious. But a film is a film is a film and this one on nearly all levels failed for me. The core of this failure lay in the lack of character development plus the stagey lighthouse and phoney crashing waves clearly shot in a studio. Redgrave's character may see the light of courage to struggle against barbarism, but the lack of any real life on his face was utterly boring. And because of this lack of any visible real struggle the dead who come to life because of him look not only dead but look as dull as he does. Lilli Palmer tried to bring life to her fate but the near love scene at one point showed just a pitiful loss on her face that appeared to me to refute the whole fantasy of her being part of his inner self. She showed herself as being utterly separate. The one scene I admired was in a cinema where the audience were indifferent to the impending WW2 on a newsreel and laughed when the comedy of another film began. That did show our apathy towards disasters and said more about the concrete reality of life than the rest of the film. This is my opinion, and my one optimistic hope is that some young viewers will see it and relate it to our own times in 2022. For them it may come to life, but sadly not for me. See Ingmar Bergman's ' The Silence ' for the real horror of loss of convictions, in a despairing world with tanks on the streets. That is the real thing, and real cinema.

Too stagy but still a good drama

[bob the moo · 1 February 2004]

When the authorities discover a lighthouse keeper is not cashing his paychecks, they go to visit him to make sure he is OK. One of the visitors gets into a chat with the lighthouse keeper, David Charleston and discovers that his desire to stay in the lighthouse is based on the fact that he is in contact with the ghosts from a ship that sunk many years ago; although the ghosts do not know they are dead. Charleston hides away - having been frustrated by those in power ignoring his warnings about fascism. However he finds that each passenger has had similar experiences that he, with the benefit of future knowledge, can learn from.

The point of this film is both obvious but also too obscure. The message of not giving up is laboured at the end, but for the majority of the film, it is hidden and damages the early meaning of the film. The pre-war setting is a morale boosting tale of sticking at it - for we never know what tomorrow will bring; it delivers a reasonable tale but I found it hard to get into the stories of the various passengers as they were not characters I was given a lot of time to get into and care about. The stuff with Charleston himself works better as I cared about him due to the time spent with him.

The film is very stagy however, it doesn't really flow very well at times and the best scenes are played out as if in a theatre. It is rather heavy at times but it still works if you know what to expect. The cast is OK but really it is all Redgrave's film. He exaggerates his performance as if he is on a stage and needing to project to the back row, but he is still very good. Mason has a minor role but always has such a good presence that it is hard to fault him. The support cast of passengers is less assured and really never get close to being real people - instead their dialogue and stories are too heavily laden with meaning.

Overall this is a reasonably good propaganda. It has more meaning and human pathos than most WWII propaganda films as it is not anti-enemy but pro-spirit and persistence. It may all be a little heavy and too stagy but it is enjoyable if you can do enough to get past the heavy message and some overly worthy acting.

Philosophical rock

[AAdaSC · 6/10 · 11 November 2015]

Michael Redgrave (Charleston) is a lighthouse keeper on a remote lighthouse on Lake Michigan. He used to be a reporter but no-one listened to his warnings about the evils of the emerging New Order in Germany and Italy. Disillusioned with mankind he chooses to live away from it all. His friend James Mason (Streeter) tells him that he thinks he is a coward and the two fall out, leaving Redgrave alone on the lighthouse island. But is he alone?

It's an interesting premise for a film and it scores with me for doing something different. However, it does drag on a little which is a shame. I wanted this film to be an eye-opening ghost chiller with a message but it only drives home a rather obvious point and isn't scary as such. It is other-worldly which is good. And there is a climax scene where the ghostly images are presented with the truth about their lives. Are they real ghosts or images conjured up in Redgrave's head? The film favours the latter for a means of wartime propaganda but the film would have been better if the former was what is actually happening. It is, of course, actually happening for Redgrave so we go along with him. But, if it was actually happening…….spooky……

As an aside, I always thought it would be a weird experience to live on a lighthouse. Turns out my wife has a lighthouse connection as one of her great ancestors was a Lighthouse Keeper at Dover. Whilst the custodian, English scientist Michael Faraday helped install the light there and Italian engineer Marconi transmitted the first radio signal abroad from it. He sent a signal over to France……..and we now have the Eurovision Song Contest…..so it was totally worthwhile.

Is Isolation Ever the Answer?

[theowinthrop · 10/10 · 27 January 2008]

David Charleston (Michael Redgrave) is an anti-Fascist who spent the entire 1930s warning the Western World of the threat of Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, and Japan. But nothing was done, and in 1940 the world is teetering on the verge of falling into the hands of these three monstrous regimes. But Charleston has gotten fed up with being "Cassandra" (the Greek seer who was doomed to always foretell the future but never be believed). He has gotten an appointment to taking care of a lighthouse in the Great Lakes, at Thunder Rock, and cynically cuts himself off from mankind.

Not totally though. He has discovered the remains of papers that concern the lives of the passenger and crew of a sailing ship, the Lady of the Lakes, which hit a reef near the site of the lighthouse in 1850, killing everyone on board. Reading of their lives he has reconstructed the lives of seven people and imagines what they were like. So they "entertain" him, by going through their normal behavior and set speeches. In particular a Doctor and his daughter (Frederick Valk and Lili Palmer) fleeing from the militarism of Germany. Valk was working on anesthesia and Palmer hoped to find a new home and a future (i.e., a husband and family) when the tragedy occurred. Redgrave takes a fancy to Palmer, and in his conversations she shows she is equally interested in him. But all of these ghosts (except the ship's Captain, Finlay Currie) are unaware that it is no longer 1850, and that they are all dead.

The crisis of the film is when Currie (who has assisted in this mental game with Redgrave) gets tired about it because Redgrave has turned the characters into caricatures and not real people. When this happens he berates Redgrave for misusing his powerful imagination. Redgrave agrees to allow them more outspoken freedom of action. But when they are more outspoken, they ask questions about the time they are in and the world as it is. Redgrave gets fed up and (despite warnings from Currie) allows Palmer to read a plaque on the wall that describes the shipwreck and the loss of everyone on board. He then tells them that the civilization as they knew it is ending, and that he has gone into the lighthouse to avoid seeing it end close up. His disillusionment is expressed to them, and then he adds that now that he has revealed the truth he sees no further use in having them around. As they are figments of his imagination he will no longer need them and they can now disappear. Redgrave is seen concentrating. Only they don't disappear.

Valk confronts him, and forces Redgrave to compare them with himself. Did civilization cease in the 19th Century due to their deaths? Is any one man (a Darwin, a Lincoln) so essential for change that without him or her change will never occur? Is isolation the answer to facing the future or to stand up and act?

I was fortunate back in the 1970s to see a stage production of THUNDER ROCK in Manhattan at the Equity Library Theatre on W. 103rd Street. The play was shorter in cast than this film version (which builds up the stupidity that Redgrave's character faced in the 1930s, leading to his cynical viewpoint). But the effect of the play was still strong then as when it first appeared in the 1940s. Civilization is always facing some disaster - but as long as someone speaks out and acts it can continue to survive.

Dull propaganda effort

[Leofwine_draca · 4/10 · 9 May 2016]

I wanted to see this film because it's a spooky ghost story set in a lighthouse, and I love lighthouse settings for movies. Sadly, this turns out to be a dull propaganda effort rather than a real movie, and despite a few atmospheric touches it's very murky and rather badly handled in my opinion.

The problem I have with THUNDER ROCK is that the morales and beliefs conveyed therein are thrust down the viewer's throat from the earliest opportunity. Given that this is a WW2 era film, there's an anti-fascist message throughout, and the viewer is all but ordered to strive and carry on the fight.

Niceties of plotting and characterisation are all but nil and most of the film is told via flashback, which just felt too obvious a construction for me. It's a shame, because the Boulting brothers are good film-makers, and the likes of Michael Redgrave and James Mason are strong actors. But a more subtle message and more straightforward storytelling would have resulted in a better movie.

An underrated film, stagey but fascinating

[chrisflack · 9/10 · 27 December 2000]

An adaptation of a stage play, this film shows that fact, but is never less than interesting. Michael Redgrave plays a writer who tries to reveal what is happening in Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, but is not allowed to do so by the papers for whom he writes. Disillusioned, he gives up and retires to a lighthouse in the Great Lakes. There he meets the ghosts of travellers shipwrecked in a storm many years before. He is eventually persuaded to try to fight fascism again and returns to the world. The acting is excellent, particularly by Redgrave himself and James Mason.

Fine acting and direction, but ...

[eye3 · 4/10 · 27 January 2008]

Michael Redgrave couldn't have given a bad performance if he wanted to. And seeing James Mason so early in his career was also a treat.

No, it was the premise of the story which disappointed me. Sold as a ghost story, this was really forerunner of the two-act psychodramas which permeated Anglo-American theater for the fifty years after WW2.

After establishing the setting of the loner in the light-house, we find that British leftist writer David Charleston took the lighthouse job on Lake Michigan only to get away from a world headed for war and which, co-incidentally, had little use for his earnest genius (the poor fellow!) For companionship he imagines six people from a log of passengers lost in a wreck from 1849. He's told only the captain that they're dead. Charleston imagines them as silly, shallow people with non-real-world consequences but the Captain persuades him to imagine them as real human beings with real lives and real struggles. I won't go into further details, only to say that Charleston's ultimate lesson is to learn to go back to his own world and live in it, to carry on the good fight, yadda, yadda, &c.

This was leftist interventionist propaganda of the sort seldom seen since it was made. It was done much better in "A Matter of Life and Death" (1946). It's well-acted, directed and photographed -- it could be worth a remake -- but I was insulted, not persuaded, by its heavily hammered point that moving to America was merely running away from life's problems -- a point which did little to endear the movie to American audiences then or since. Indeed, the worst isolationism here was not America's geography but David Charleston's egotism. That human failing can be found anywhere.

Three Cheers for Channel 81 "Talking Pictures"

[howardmorley · 16 February 2018]

All the reviewers who wished they could see this film again (some of whom saw it originally in 1942!), can now see it again if they are resident British and subscribe to Freeview tv on Channel 81 It is shown regularly on this wonderful channel which I constantly watch if you can put up with the adverts which finances it, as it saves paying for numerous dvds which I used to do before I discovered this tv station.For example, every Sunday @ 9.p.m. GMT they are repeating the wonderful mid 60s episodes of "The Human Jungle" starring Herbert Lom which I originally saw when it was transmitted (I am now 72).

Some reviewers thought Thunder Rock was too stagey.Does it matter? I saw the classic R.C.Sherriff's "Journey's End" on Youtube the other day which of course is based on his play.What if Michael Redgrave is a bit declamatory at times, he was an accomplished stage actor first.In 1942 Britain was in a precarious position so of course the Government sought propaganda films to help morale & the war effort.See this film on the aforesaid channel, the tv station is bound to repeat it occasionally.

" .....you are a traitor to your own intelligence..."

[Brucey_D · 9/10 · 21 January 2019]

Charleston (Redgrave) lives in self-inflicted isolation as a lighthouse keeper, having become completely disenchanted with the outside world, most of which is complacent in the face of rising evil and looming war. In a dialogue with spirits of the past, he re-evaluates his decision to isolate himself.

Robert Ardrey's 1939 play railed against the widespread complacency at the rise of fascism, and anticipated WWII. That the play flopped in New York on first release and yet did well in wartime London a little later says plenty about how receptive the audience was to the message. In this film adaptation the story is broadened and filled in; it played to packed houses in 1943 America and did well in the UK.

Here the Boulting brothers -perhaps better known for their later comedies- have made an excellent film that is both absorbing and intriguing.

Of course it was made in wartime and the message is played for all it is worth as propaganda. But that doesn't make this film any less interesting or thought provoking. It is a little less overtly metaphysical than some other films from around this time and that is no bad thing; one foot is kept grounded at all times, more or less.

Someone once said "the greatest journeys we go on are those in our own minds" -or words to that effect- and this play/film is testimony to that.

The message that came through most strongly for me was that we owe the past a heavy debt; it is, in the present, always our obligation not to turn away, not to give up or hide away in the face of adversity.

Despite its flaws this film rates a 9/10 from me.

Between A Rock And A Hard Place

[writers_reign · 5/10 · 27 May 2017]

Unless you happened to see the play - by Robert Ardrey - on which the Boulting Brothers based their film then the only selling point is Michael Redgrave. By 1942 he was a seasoned film actor having served a distinguished apprenticeship in the theatre and although it did no harm to feature the likes of James Mason, Finlay Currie, Barbara Mullen and Lily Palmer in support by this stage of his film career Redgrave was fully capable of carrying a picture by himself. It is, of course, also necessary to remember that the film was shot in 1942 and released the following year, in other words right in the heart of World War II so it would be foolish if not futile not to expect a large propaganda element which now seems irrelevant. Bearing that in mind and making allowances this remains a half decent effort with Redgrave delivering the goods.

Anatomy of a shipwreck - but did they really all get lost?

[clanciai · 10/10 · 13 May 2017]

A Boulting brothers film is always a stunning treat if you are interested in humanity. They always choose very special topics that touch the very core of humanity and bring out all kinds of fascinating insights focusing on the treasures of human experience. This film was made during the darkest hours of the war in 1942, when Singapore was lost and the darkness of dictatorship and its violence reached its farthest limits and leading intellectuals and writers of the world committed suicide, like Stefan Zweig, and somehow the writer of this story (Bernard Miles, a great actor himself,) gets to the very heart of darkness of humanity and history. It is therefore one of those very rare and extremely metaphysical films.

Michael Redgrave has given up on the world and is looking forward to the end of humanity and civilization, he doesn't care any more about anything as he wasted his best years on a lonesome crusade against fascism in Europe with no response at all, since people allowed the war to come anyway, so he absconds into a remote lighthouse beyond everything, where he doesn't even read books. But he finds the log book of of a ship of immigrants that went down by this lighthouse in 1849 with 60 lives lost. He buries himself in this manifestation of a cruel and unjust fate killing 60 innocent people, and in trying to understand this destiny he brings them back alive. Are they ghosts or are they real? They are real enough to him, and he is not alone in having made the experience that ghosts can be more alive than live people.

The film exploits this strange field of occult metaphysics and succeeds in realizing all their different fates, that is six of them, including the captain (Finlay Currie), a Viennese doctor and his wife and daughter (Lilli Palmer), a suffragette 70 years ahead of her time and another family with a Dickensian background of hardship. As their stories develop and get more real the deeper you get into them, the web of humanity grows constantly more touching and convincing in its realism and gripping honesty, ultimately leading to the conclusion that there is always something left to do, you can't get rid of your human and universal responsibility whatever your disillusionment with the world might be, and, of course, the whole thing leads to a release of serenity.

Someone said it was one of the most impressive movies in her experience, and I tend to agree. Even the music is perfect, somewhat reminiscent of a violin romance by Sibelius. This is a film for all times with a universal message that never can lose its actuality.

Disappointed!

[gyplord · 3/10 · 20 September 2000]

Unfortunately, despite the storyline being unusual and imaginative, the film itself proves to be slow and heavy-handed. It proves to be too "stagey" for the screen and the settings outside of the lighthouse do nothing to enhance the proceedings. Much of the acting is either lacklustre, or overbearing, and the film tends to be far too drawn out for its own good. In fact, it ends up proving to be a good remedy for insomnia!!