Dare to compare

I read and can't say I agree with his evaluation of the three movies--I would rate them 1935, 1984, 1962 in that order.

One thing this critic really hit hard was that Gable was charismatic and outgoing and always "smiling a lot" which he found Hollywoodish. But this is a description of Christian I pulled from an historian


"All those who knew Christian agreed that he was handsome and of athletic build. He seems to have been an honest and forthright man, normally with a happy and friendly disposition, and very charming. He seems to have been liked by everyone on board the Bounty with the possible exception of Hayward and Hallett (whom nobody liked)."

"It is remarkable that none of the men, loyalists or muutineers, who went through so much suffering as a result of the mutiny, ever had one negative word to say about Christian. All of them saw their misfortunes as brought about by Bligh."

Off that first paragraph, Gable (or Errol Flynn earlier) seems like good casting.

A separate historian made a point that Bligh's explanation for the mutiny--that the mutineers did it because they wanted to return to Tahiti--has one really major flaw. The mutineers, or at least the educated officers, would have known that the British Navy would come to Tahiti to hunt them. Christian himself was from a good family--why would he have thrown his life in England away?

It also should be pointed out that the mutineers originally attempted to settle on Tubuai, not Tahiti, and only sailed to Tahiti when the natives drove them off Tubuai. This undercuts that they mutineed in order to return to Tahiti.

I don't know the bottom line, but I am skeptical about Bligh's version.