Cheap Hell in the Pacific (DVD) (Lee Marvin, Toshirô Mifune) (John Boorman) Price

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Customer Reviews of Hell in the Pacific

One of the weirder war movies I've seen
It's been a long time since I saw this on the big screen (I was in my teens), but I remember a few vivid images of this intense drama of two men, one American, one Japanese, stranded together on a tiny Pacific island. Although bitter enemies, the y each go through a transformation of character and purpose, forced upon them by their harsh circumstances. In a way, the film is as much a commentary on how mankind can get along, or how we can destroy each other, depending on which way the wind blows (literally, here). Parts of the movie seem to drag on with little development, while others are rich in humor, sadness, violence, and characterization. I didn't like the ending, as it seemed pointless. However, that may well be the message of the entire movie.

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A terrific psychological action picture
"Hell in the Pacific" is a fairly early film in the career of John Boorman, a sort of stealth director whose name rarely occurs to you right away as one of the greats but who has done excellent work over many decades. "Deliverance" was four years off, "Excalibur" and "Hope and Glory" further out, and the clean and sharp "The General" a full three decades away.

Lee Marvin is an American pilot washed up on the shore of a small Pacific island in the waning days of World War II -- only to find the one other inhabitant is a Japanese officer played by the awesome Toshiro Mifune. Although they carry on the larger war between them for a time, they gradually realize the only way either is going to survive and get off the island is if they work together. But can they do it?

Mifune's dialogue is all in Japanese and not subtitled, so he is as mysterious and threatening to the viewer as he is to the Marvin character, but we can tell by his actions, self-built fortifications, and survival schemes that he's a smarter, more disciplined man than the American. For a time, all the Marvin character can think to do is pick away at the former's elaborate survival arrangements, and there is quite a bit of humor in that.

Leonard Maltin and the other Amazon reviewers complain about the ending, which comes as an abrupt and dissatisfying shock, but I think it offers the viewer a choice of interpretations. It could be taken straight, as the objective fate of our two heroes, or it could suggest a metaphor for their (and our) inability to get along together, an image of humanity's potential ultimate fate -- something more in the characters' heads than on the ground....

Anyway, a fine, tight little movie.

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Incomplete, murky, May-04 version from MGM
MGM cut the heart out of this excellent intense movie, when it excised the scenes of "training" Lee Marvin by Toshiro Mifune in the art of sword/staff fighting, and the scenes of hand to hand combat in/around the abandoned freighter. Further, the video quality is so dark one can sometimes barely follow the action.