Herman Wouk’s novel-to-play about a neurotic, barely competent, deservedly unpopular Navy Captain endangering his ship during a severe storm, and taken out of command by his own Lieutenant, has always been catnip for ham acting. Who could resist its series of showy moments in court, none more so than Captain Queeg, reliving a nervous breakdown with strawberries under oath! It’s the only thing people remember about Edward Dmytryk's overrated 1954 film with Humphrey Bogart rattling those ball-bearings. The film significantly ‘opens’ the play, saving the courtroom for act three. Other versions stick closer to the play: 85% courtroom; 15% soft-soap epilogue at a hotel conference room that celebrates either patriotism or mediocrity. Hard to tell which. And yet, the damn thing always works; the situation too meaty to miss. (Plus it’s a courtroom drama, dummy.) Back in his commercial doldrums days, Robert Altman made a starry tv film of it; now it serves as swansong for director William Friedkin, both men keeping the play structure, but Friedkin updating to the present. Probably a mistake since a main part of the prosecution is keyed to mutineer Lt. Maryk’s (Jake Lacy) adoption of half-digested psychological terms. Outlier behavior in the 1940s, hardly a stretch these days. And Friedkin’s big cast of entertaining blowhards all seem to have won their sea legs rewatching A FEW GOOD MEN/’92 rather than on a ship. Yet the film comes together just where the rest fall apart, in the mealy-mouthed epilogue when triumphant defense attorney Jason Clarke shows up drunk at a victory party after ‘slaying’ reviled Captain Queeg, played with a weird sense of chuckling defeatism by Keifer Sutherland. Considering that the likes of Henry Fonda, José Ferrer, Barry Sullivan*, Eric Bogosian, John Rubinstein & David Schwimmer have all been undone by this belayed climax, how did Clarke pull it off? Listen closely, and you’ll hear the answer: Clarke somehow switches vocal gears to channel an impression of Gene Hackman giving the speech. A conjuring trick that must have left Friedkin smiling as he was the guy who directed Hackman in THE FRENCH CONNECTION/’71, career breakthroughs for both men.
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *Sullivan in a 1955 tv adaptation with original stage Queeg Lloyd Nolan.
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