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Moguls & Movie Stars: A History of Hollywood

Alan Ladd: The True Quiet Man


            The film takes place in 1805, during the Napoleonic Wars. Captain Aubrey of the British man-of-war HMS Surprise is ordered to pursue the French privateer Acheron and "burn, sink or take her a prize." As the film opens, Surprise midshipman Hollom briefly spies a dark shape in a fog bank. After some hesitation, the call to beat to quarters is given. Aubrey and the other officers at first see nothing, but the Surprise soon comes under attack by the Acheron. The British warship is heavily damaged and its rudder destroyed, while its own shots fail to penetrate the Acheron's hull. The crew tows the Surprise into the fog, where it evades its pursuer.Aubrey learns from a crewman who saw the Acheron built in America that due to a cutting-edge design, the privateer is heavier and faster than the Surprise. The senior officers consider the ship out of their class, and such a ship could tip the balance of power in Napoleon's favor. Rather than return to port, Aubrey orders a refit at sea while they pursue the Acheron. The Acheron once again ambushes the Surprise, but by using a decoy the ship manages to escape in the night.Following the privateer south, the Surprise rounds Cape Horn. In the high winds the topmast breaks, throwing a popular crewman into the water. Aubrey is forced to leave the man to his fate, lest the wreck sink the Surprise. The ship heads to the Galapagos Islands, where Aubrey is sure the Acheron will want to prey on Britain's whaling fleet. The ship's doctor, Maturin, is interested in the isle for the strange creatures claimed to reside on the isles. Aubrey promises his friend that he will have several days to explore the islands.When Surprise reaches the Galapagos they recover the survivors of the whaling ship Albatross, destroyed by the Acheron. Realizing the ship is close, Aubrey hastily pursues the privateer, ordering a departure from the Galapagos. Maturin feels that Aubrey is going back on his word, and is following the Acheron more out of pride than duty. During their pursuit, the Surprise is becalmed. The heat and lack of water lead the crew to believe there is a Jonah aboard someone who is bringing the ship bad luck. Hollom is singled out as the source of the bad luck, and his popularity with the crew plummets; the ship's carpenter's mate openly insults Hollom by failing to salute, and is condemned to a flogging. It is revealed in a deleted scene that the crew's sympathies lie with the carpenter and not Hollom, who later commits suicide by jumping into the ocean clutching a cannon ball. After a memorial service for Hollom, the wind picks up, followed by a downpour of rain, and the pursuit continues.One of the ship's Marines, attempting to bring down an albatross, accidentally shoots Maturin, who quickly loses consciousness. The surgeon's mate informs Aubrey that the bullet dragged a piece of the doctor's shirt inside his abdomen and must be removed or it will cause a deadly infection. The surgeon's mate states that the operation should be performed on solid ground. Despite closing in on the Acheron, Aubrey turns around and takes the doctor back to the Galapagos. Maturin performs surgery on himself using a mirror and removes the bullet and piece of shirt.Having relented his pursuit of the Acheron, Aubrey grants Maturin the chance to explore the island before they head for home. On crossing the island looking for a species of flightless cormorant, the doctor discovers the Acheron, anchored in a bay on the island's opposite side. Abandoning his specimens to make it back quickly, Maturin warns Aubrey, and the Surprise readies for battle. Due to the Acheron's sturdy hull, the Surprise must get in close to deal damage. After observing the deceptive qualities of one of Maturin's specimens a stick insect Aubrey has the idea to disguise Surprise as a whaling ship, assuming the French, in their greed, would close to capture the ship rather than destroy it outright. The French take the bait and the Surprise pulls alongside the frigate, destroying her mainmast. Aubrey and Pullings lead boarding parties across the wreckage. With the help of whalers freed from the Acheron's brig, the French ship is taken. Looking for the French captain, Aubrey is directed to the sickbay, where the French doctor tells him his captain is dead. The doctor offers Aubrey the captain's sword.The Acheron and Surprise are repaired. While the Surprise will remain in the Galapagos, Pullings is promoted to Captain and charged with sailing the captured ship to Valparaiso. As the Acheron sails away, Maturin mentions that a French crewman had told him that their doctor had died months ago. Realizing the Acheron's captain tricked him by dressing as the doctor, Aubrey gives the order to beat to quarters and escort the Acheron to Valparaiso. Maturin is again denied the chance to explore the Galapagos. Aubrey wryly notes that since the bird Maturin seeks is flightless, "it's not going anywhere", and the two begin to play Luigi Boccherini's "La Musica Notturna Delle Strade Di Madrid No. 6, Op. 30" on cello and violin as the crew assumes battle stations.
    

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World


            Walter Mitty is a negative assets manager at 'Life' magazine who daydreams of adventures to get away out of the tedium of his boring job. Mitty also has a crush on a co-worker named Cheryl, but never has the nerve to tell her his feelings towards her. Mitty works with photojournalist Sean O'Connell, whose images are highly regarded. O'Connell has sent Mitty his latest negatives and a wallet as a gift in appreciation of Mitty's work. O'Connell believes negative #25 captures the "quintessence" of Life and that it should be used for the cover of the magazine's final print issue as it converts to online status. The negative is missing, however, and Walter is forced to stall for time with corporate transition manager Ted Hendricks, who is handling the downsizing. While viewing the other negatives outside Life's offices, Cheryl approaches Mitty and suggests that he think of the negatives as clues to Sean's location. They look at three of them, including one of a person's thumb with a unique ring on it, and another of a curved piece of wood. A third picture of a boat leads Mitty to determine that O'Connell is in Greenland. Mitty promptly flies there to find him.After arriving in the Greenland capital city of Nuuk, Mitty meets with a local bartender who explains that O'Connell left on a ship. To find him, Mitty would need to go on the postal helicopter that delivers mail to the various towns and outposts along the coast, and the pilot is drunk. Mitty recognizes the pilot's thumb with the unique ring and realizes he is on the right track. He at first declines to fly with the intoxicated pilot, but imagines Cheryl singing "Space Oddity", gains a new confidence and boards the helicopter. Nearing the ship, Mitty learns the helicopter cannot land upon it. Misunderstanding the pilot, instead of jumping into a dinghy boat nearing to catch him, Mitty aims for the main vessel and misses and falls in the ocean. He splashes down into ice-cold, shark-infested waters, losing a box of ship-to-shore radio components before being brought aboard.Mitty learns that O'Connell departed the ship earlier. The crew offers him some clementine cake O'Connell left behind; Mitty discovers O'Connell's destinations in the wrapping paper. The itinerary directs Mitty to Iceland, where O'Connell is photographing the volcano Eyjafjallajökull, and he arrives at the local village of Skógar near the volcano using a longboard, and notices O'Connell on the plane flying near the volcano. An eruption forces Mitty to flee, and as there is nothing left for him to do, he obeys a text message recalling him to New York.For failing to recover the negative, his first failure in a long career with the magazine, Mitty is fired by Hendricks. He learns that Cheryl, who was let go earlier, seems to have reconciled with her estranged husband. Mitty returns home discouraged and visits his mother, throwing away the wallet he received from O'Connell. To his surprise, Mitty recognizes the curve of the piano in his mother's house while looking at the last photograph. When asked, Mitty's mom mentions having met O'Connell. She had told Mitty before but he was daydreaming and failed to hear her.Mitty discovers O'Connell is in the Himalayas, and finds him photographing a rare snow leopard. When asked about the negative, O'Connell explains that the message on the gift wrapping to "look inside" was literal; the negative was in the wallet. Unfortunately, Mitty had interpreted this message as a direction to look inside the tissue paper in the box containing the wallet, and it could also be interpreted as referring to the inscription stamped into the leather inside the wallet. When pressed to reveal the image on the negative, O'Connell dismisses the question and joins in a high-altitude football game with some locals. Mitty flies to Los Angeles but is detained by airport security during a misunderstanding (mainly stemming from his having traveled through Yemen to Afghanistan). Mitty calls the only person he knows in Los Angeles: Todd Maher, a representative at eHarmony who has kept in contact during Mitty's adventures.While helping his mother sell her piano, Mitty recounts his story but mentions he does not have the wallet anymore. His mother says she always keeps his knickknacks and gives him the wallet that she retrieved from the trash. Finding inside the wallet a small manila envelope the size of a single-frame 35mm negative, an emboldened Mitty delivers it to Life magazine, tells management that it was the photograph O'Connell wanted for the final issue, and berates Hendricks for disrespecting the staff that made the magazine so honored before walking away from the office, humiliating him in front of his recently hired staff.Mitty reunites with Cheryl, emboldens himself enough to tell her outright that he has been thinking about and inspired by her, and learns that Cheryl's ex-husband was only at her house to repair the refrigerator. Mitty tells Cheryl of his adventures and admits that he still does not know what negative #25 shows. Mitty and Cheryl see the final issue of Life at a newsstand, with its cover dedicated to the staff. It is accompanied by the photograph from negative #25, showing Mitty sitting outside of the Life building, examining a contact sheet. Mitty and Cheryl continue their walk down the street holding hands.
    

Samuel Goldwyn Jr.

Samuel Goldwyn Jr. Movies or Tv Shows (upto Dec 2024) - Watch Online

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