THE BEACHCOMBER / VESSEL OF WRATH (1938)

Top German producer Erich Pommer, in exile from the Nazis and hopscotching international movie hubs, teamed up with Charles Laughton, licking his wounds after I, CLAUDIUS/’37 imploded, forming Mayflower Pictures for three films before WWII shuttered the outfit.  This one, first & best of the lot, from a 1931 Somerset Maugham story, also saw Pommer calling the shots (for the first & last time) when writer Bartlett Cormack bailed on directing chores.  And while you definitely feel a lack of control behind the camera, it’s less of a problem than you expect since Maugham’s story (anticipating E.M. Forester’s 1935 THE AFRICAN QUEEN in all sorts of ways*) is strong enough to take care of itself and the cast so miraculously right.  Laughton’s a layabout drunk in a tropical paradise, always in trouble with the locals, the law & his bank balance, doing his best to ignore responsibility.  Meanwhile, do-gooder Missionaries, Elsa Lancaster’s teacher and her doctor/brother Tyrone Guthrie, both in their way, nearly as eccentric as Laughton’s ne’er-do-well, bring uplift to the non-believing natives.  But when an island in their archipelago succumbs to typhoid, just as Guthrie is felled by recurring malaria, Laughton & Lancaster must put aside differences and rise to the occasion.  The film is quite the charmer, if a bit over-extended before the medical emergency adds a dramatic jolt.  But everybody’s a winner here, including Robert Newton as the Island Controller (with a wayward, unplaceable accent: Dutch?  French? Cockney?).  Even the locals, for a change, are nicely particularized and get their moments.  Fun to see husband & wife Laughton & Lancaster playing an opposites-attract couple, with Lancaster in the most fully rounded role of her career.

DOUBLE-BILL: Newton takes Laughton’s role in the less well received 1954 remake.  (Not seen here.)  OR: *THE AFRICAN QUEEN/’52, displaying uncanny similarities.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: Famed stage director Tyrone Guthrie only acted in two films, this and in Mayflower’s next, ST. MARTIN’S LANE/SIDEWALKS OF LONDON/’38, presumably at Laughton’s behest as Guthrie had directed him in a season of rep at the rejuvenated Old Vic, including his only shot at MACBETH.