Last week by popular vote you selected this streaming film for screening & discussion...
by Nathaniel R
It lasted 30 days... You will remember it as long as you live."
So went one of the chief taglines for the Oscar hopeful Voyage of the Damned (1976). It reads like a threat -- when taglines attack! -- this promise of a long unforgettable sit. Having only viewed The Voyage of the Damned for the very first time this weekend, it's too soon to say if we'll remember it for as long as we live, but the other part of the statement is accurate. We won't make a snarky comment about the running time (too easy!) but the titular passage was indeed a month long moment of intensely shameful global history.
For those unfamilar with the history it goes, very briefly, like this...
Passengers angrily leaving the screening of a film within the film we were screening (Voyage of the Damned).
On May 13th of 1939, less than four months before World War II began, Germany let 900+ Jews leave the country on a ship bound for Havana, Cuba. This was an elaborate political maneuver, part PR move /all propaganda, as the Nazis fully intended that ship to return from Cuba with all of its passengers, having made its social chaos and anti-semitism stoking engineered point that no nation wanted the Jews. It was also unfathomably cruel, an elaborate 'psyche! we're still going to kill you after all.'
Voyage of the Damned let's you in on the Nazi plan from its very first scene, removing any ignorance from audiences now (should they chance upon the movie -- it's streaming on HBO) that might come from either a lack of education about global events of 1939 or an inability to infer meaning from movie titles; this isn't a leisure cruise and things won't end well for the passengers.
"The nightmare's nearly over, dearest."
Dame Wendy Hiller gets the first line of dialogue spoken once the ship's horn blows and we set sail 15 minutes into the film. The line's placement, given the broad and messy Oscar-nominated script to come, feels like accidental brilliance. The nightmare was of course just beginning. In 1939 most of the world's nations were still trying to either appease Hitler or stay neutral, assuming the fever would pass (sound familiar?). In Voyage we see this through multiple maddening off-ship arguments between politicians and bureaucrats and reporters (James Mason, Fernando Rey, Michael Constantine, among them). Most memorable in the off-ship sequences are Ben Gazarra as a righteously angry Jewish reporter and Orson Welles as a cigar-smoking amoral politician in Cuba. This shameful 'look the other way, protect your own pockets/power' default stance, is the hardest-hitting finger-waving subject of the movie.
But therein also lies the problem. Voyage of the Damned is so overstuffed with incident, subplot, and actual villains that that target isn't hit with anything like a bullseye. Not that the movie could have done without all three but the imbalance prevents smooth sailing into movie history.
the complex busy plot surrounding these two little girls reads as very important in the first few minutes. But the movie drops it for over an hour.
Incidents
The story itself is so fascinating and potent that it's hard not to long for something more Altmanesque wherein all the elements are woven together into fluid sequences where scenes never quite begin or end and the humanity is bustling and ever shifting within each frame. This Stuart Rosenberg (Cool Hand Luke, Amityville Horror) movie is far more pedestrian and TV episodic. It has a habit of jumping from one scene about two people into another and then to another, often filmed in closeup, rather than viewing the whole collection of characters as one complex human tapestry, always inhabiting the same 1939 hellscape. The characters disappear for such long stretches that sometimes you've forgotten all about them or who they were by the time they resurface. Even the most movie-friendly emotional episodes -like one man's quest to be reunited with his daughters --can feel like easily removeable subplots rather, than crucial moments in an evolving human tragedy.
Don't speak! (you're not pulling off these scenes)
Subplots
The less successful stories are... well, let us not speak of Malcolm McDowell and Lynn Fredrick's embarrassing youthful romance subplot or its undermotivated tragic ending. The latter does at least serve as connective thread between the film's two most hysterical sequences, the first a broadly acted mess (what is Sam Wanamaker doing?) and the other a polarizing but, we'd argue, awesome scene (more on that later in our favourite things about the picture).
Villains
Though Voyage of the Damned is most impactful when its shaming the non-Nazi world that let the Nazis happen, it dilutes the message by leaning heavily on the less abstract villain wearing the Swastika. Helmut Griem, just four years past his own 'neutrality' when it came to those same disruptive thugs in Cabaret, is now playing a true believer. He's so loathsome that I admit I was waiting for him to get his comeuppance throughout in a kind of Tarantino-revisionist desire for bloody revenge. Why are the captain and his crew (who all seem disgusted by the Nazis) and the 900 passengers (who definitely hate Nazis) letting this gang of about 5 Nazis get away with all of this? In one sequence a group of Jewish passengers have finally had enough of their lives as political sacrificial pawns and take up axes and hammers. Sadly, though believably given human nature and the chaos that springs from desperation, they don't aim the weapons at the actual Nazis on board but someone who is trying to figure out a way to help them.
That someone is the ship's captain (a beautifully solemn and stoic Max von Sydow) who exudes authority and righteous order; if people can't have safety and dignity in the world, by god they will have it on his ship!
Several readers assumed we would hate this picture so we must quickly state that we didn't. We just wished it were better. It could have been a great movie with a better screenplay, fewer broad or silly acting choices (why do only the lower class passengers speak with German accents when every single character is German?), and more artful multi-tasking direction.
a few favourite things...
...both scenes featuring Katharine Ross, who won the Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress before Oscar decided against her altogether, really sing. Practically a whole movie has passed by the time she shows up but she's worth the wait. Her first scene is a stereotypical hooker-with-a-heart-of-gold introduction but she plays it beautifully, leaning away from trope-mandated goodness and more into genuine confusion and improvisation... she's trying to figure out how to act in this confounding scenario she did not see coming even if you can still tell that her heart is gold. She's even better in her second (and only other) scene where we learn she is secretly Jewish and that her parents are onboard the ship that can't dock. It's the most exquisitely acted scene in the entire film with all three actors (ever reliable Yentl papa Nehemiah Persoff plays her father) delivering a gut-wrenching estranged-family mini-movie against the ticking clock of three absolutely inadequate minutes.
...Lee Grant famously nabbed an Oscar nomination and the clip that surely sealed it, despite Oscar passing on the movie as a whole, was her positively mental self-service hair salon. And herewith a very uncool confession: this sequence really got to me. But then I am quite regularly got by the always stellar Grant. I felt every snip of those scissors as if her character Lili Rosen was willing on a psychotic break rather than Grant doing the arguably easier acting choice of re-enacting one.
...Paul Koslo and "introducing Jonathan Pryce" as Aaron and Joseph. We rarely see them apart and they are not related. As such they are easy to view as gay lovers who have narrowly escaped death in concentration camps (the re-shaving of their heads being a Nazi threat on board). Were they meant to read as gay in 1976 or was this tacit unconscious acknowledgment that there were also gay victims of the Holocaust... without having to have the conscious bravely to actually depict it? It's difficult for us to guess in 2020 what was going through the minds of the filmmakers and actors in 1976 but Koslo & Pryce's close physical proximity throughout the picture makes their lack of romantic affection in their second scene together, a totally private reunion in their shared cabin, when they both had literally thought the other dead, the worst of their otherwise solid scenes.
But they're two of the more interesting characters in an overstuffed ship filled with many dud roles. If they were meant to be seen as a gay couple, than the depiction of Aaron as one of the most traditionally masculine* men on board is yet more interesting given the context of 1976. (*Aaron takes frequent beatings, takes charge in physically dangerous situations, and never once appears to be on the verge of an emotional breakdown like so many of the teary eyed or emotionally frayed men -- we're not condoning this view of masculinity, mind you, but it is the "traditional" one.)
... And Faye Dunaway in general. GODDESS. Voyage of the Damned was released the same year as Network, so we're talking supernova peak. The camera loves her so much one knows that it longs to become sentient and ditch the dreary prestige trappings, and just follow her into some other more fabulous movie entirely... or at least into her dressing room.
She is extra. Though she's a doomed Jewess and the coolest (in both senses) person in the room at all times, she also whip-smart and able to pragmatically set aside all the panic in service of her own fabulousity. She turns it out with a cheeky monocle and thigh-high dominatrix boots during the ship's incongruously festive and weirdly racist costume ball in which many of the Jewish prisoners are wearing "oriental" masks. Later that same evening she'll let her husband think he's seducing her while she's actually seducing him into undressing her.
...then she'll casually just hang there, half naked, in full view of the ship's doctor once he interrupts the nookie because someone else's husband went and died. This bitch cannot with everyone else's hysterics. The only people that ever ruffle her are her husband (Oskar Werner) -- in fairness that hairpiece is unnerving -- and Lee Grant with a pair of scissors.
All that said, Daniella Isaacs was correct in the comments on the readers poll that the more camp-friendly elements of Voyage are a bit hard to fully enjoy given the context in which they occur.
P.S. Oh yes, the mandatory awards chatter.
Because we know you love a list, the 'star' performances ranked
- Katharine Ross
- Lee Grant
there's a reason it was those two with awards shows... but the following four actors are in fine form, too - Nehemiah Persoff
- Max Von Sydow
- Orson Welles
- Maria Schell
- Victor Spinetti
others with good moments... - Faye Dunaway
- Helmut Griem
- Paul Koslo
- James Mason
- Janet Suzman
nothing much is asked of them beyond a single note... - Denholm Elliott
- Fernando Rey
- Michael Constantine
- Wendy Hiller
- Julie Harris
- Leonardo Rossiter
- Jose Ferrer
- Luther Adler
these characters make zero sense in the script - a tough break for two talented men - Oskar Werner
- Malcolm McDowell
no comment - Lynn Frederick
- Sam Wanamaker
Those are the only "single title card" players so they would have been the nominees if the SAG Awards had existed back then and had the film received a SAG Outstanding Cast nomination (which it probably would have given that EVERY star was in it). You know how we like to project backwards to discuss such things.
Seaman Berg can get it.
Among the expansive cast that weren't famous enough in 1976 to warrant their own card, our favourites were these four: Anthony Higgins as "Seaman Berg" who is way too sexy for this movie and unfortunately way too brave to notice that he won't survive a roomful of Nazis if he starts challenging them without backup; Ina Skriver, a Danish actress, who has a beautiful moment singing a German ballad to the passengers; Marika Rivera who cuts a funny blowsy figure as the madame of a bordello in Cuba; and Jonathan Pryce in his film debut.
Oscars vs Globes
Voyage of the Damned was clearly intended as one of the big Oscar players of 1976, arriving in all its slow paced prestige for Christmas in movie theaters. Yes, Hollywood has been releasing super depressing prestige dramas during the festive holiday week for aeons. Things didn't work out so well for the picture in that regard with just three nominations: Adapted Screenplay, Supporting Actress (Lee Grant), and Original Score (Lalo Schifrin). The Golden Globes were kinder offering it twice as many nominations: Best Picture (Drama), Supporting Actor (Oskar Werner), Best Supporting Actress x 2 (Lee Grant AND Katharine Ross), Screenplay, and Score.
It's worth noting that the supporting lists at the Globes and the Oscars that year did not see eye to eye. As for Best Picture, though, Voyage of the Damned was the only Globe Drama nominee not to transfer to the corresponding Oscar nomination.
A comparison chart...
| GLOBES | OSCARS |
 |
 |
| Best Picture, Drama | Best Picture |
| All the President's Men | All the President's Men |
| Bound for Glory | Bound for Glory |
| Network | Network |
| Rocky ★ | Rocky ★ |
| Voyage of the Damned | Taxi Driver |
 |
 |
| Best Supporting Actor | Best Supporting Actor |
| Marty Feldman, Silent Movie | Ned Beatty, Network |
| Ron Howard, the Shootist | Burgess Meredith, Rocky |
| Laurence Olivier, Marathon Man ★ | Laurence Olivier, Marathon Man |
| Jason Robards, All the President's Men | Jason Robards, All the President's Men ★ |
| Oskar Werner, Voyage of the Damned | Burt Young, Rocky |
 |
 |
| Best Supporting Actress | Best Supporting Actress |
| Lee Grant, Voyage of the Damned | Jane Alexander, All the President's Men |
| Marthe Keller, Marathon Man | Jodie Foster, Taxi Driver |
| Piper Laurie, Carrie | Lee Grant, Voyage of the Damned |
| Bernadette Peters, Silent Movie | Piper Laurie, Carrie |
| Katharine Ross, Voyage of the Damned ★ | Beatrice Straight, Network ★ |
| Shelley Winters, Next Stop Greenwich Village |
Whether or not you prefer the Oscar list (and obviously every sane person is glad Taxi Driver snuck in there) it's always wonderful to be reminded that the Golden Globes often embrace comedy which is their best trait since it gives them their own identity and because comedy shouldn't be shunned when it's brilliant. (Bernadette Peters is hysterically funny in Silent Movie so well done there, Globes.)
Have you seen Voyage of the Damned? Do you also wish it would be remade with a more artful and commanding directorial hand? Do you want to do these Reader's Choice streaming convos more often? If so, speak up.