Mutiny on the Bounty (novel)

In 1932 Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall wrote their novel Mutiny on the Bounty based on the real story of the mutiny against Lieutenant William Bligh, commanding officer of HMS Bounty, and the only officer of the British Navy to have mutiny enacted against them.

From the novel have arisen two movies with the same title.

The first was a 1935 film starring Charles Laughton, Clark Gable and Franchot Tone. David Niven and James Cagney also had bit parts in the movie.

The only Oscar won by the movie was for Best Picture for its producers, Irving Thalberg and Albert Lewin.
It also received seven additional nominations:

• Best Actor in a Leading Role - Clark Gable
  • Charles Laughton
  • Franchot Tone
• Best Director - Frank Lloyd
• Best Film Editing - Margaret Booth
• Best Music, Score - Nat W. Finston (head of departmment) and Herbert Stothart ("Love Song of Tahiti" written by Walter Jurmann, uncredited)
• Best Writing, Screenplay - Jules Furthman, Talbot Jennings and Carey Wilson

The movie was remade in 1962 under the directorship of Lewis Milestone and starring Marlon Brando and Trevor Howard. This version did not win any Oscars but was nominated for seven:

• Academy Award for Best Picture - Aaron Rosenberg
• Academy Award for Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Color - George W. Davis, Henry Grace, Hugh Hunt and J. McMillan Johnson
• Best Cinematography, Color - Robert Surtees
• Best Effects, Special Effects - A. Arnold Gillespie (visual) and Milo B. Lory (audible)
• Best Film Editing - John McSweeney Jr.
• Best Music, Score - Substantially Original - Bronislau Kaper
• Best Music, Song - Bronislau Kaper (music) and Paul Francis Webster (lyrics) - For the song Love Song from Mutiny on the Bounty (Follow Me)

Several other movies with various titles have been based on the true story, including The Bounty (1984) which starred Anthony Hopkins as Bligh and Mel Gibson as Christian.

A musical based on the same story appeared in the West End during the 1980s. It was written by and starred David Essex.

Further reading

• Caroline Alexander, The Bounty: The True Story of the Mutiny on the Bounty, Viking Penguin, 2003, hardcover, 512 pages, ISBN 067003133X

ISBN 067003133X

William Bligh - Meuterei auf der Bounty, Erdmann Verlag Tuebingen . Description of actual travel logs by W. Bligh, published 1791 and 1793 by Georg Forster and his father in Berlin as "Magazin von merkwuerdigen neuen Reisebeschreibungen".