Lord of the Flies (1963 film)
Encyclopedia
Lord of the Flies is a 1963 film adaptation
of William Golding
's novel of the same name
. It was directed by Peter Brook
and produced by Lewis M. Allen
, known since for producing films based on modern-classic novel
s. The film was in production for much of 1961 though the film was not released until 1963. Golding himself supported the film. When Kenneth Tynan
was a script editor for Ealing Studios
he commissioned a script of Lord of the Flies from Nigel Kneale
, but Ealing Studios closed in 1959 before it could be produced.
), are due to be evacuated due to the danger of remaining in England. Their airliner is shot down by briefly glimpsed fighter planes, and ditches near a remote island.
The main character Ralph (who later emerges as a reasonable and well-meaning personality) is then seen walking through a tropical forest, where he meets up with an intelligent and chubby boy, who admits that his school nickname was Piggy, but asks that Ralph should not repeat that. The two then go to the beach where they find a conch shell which Ralph blows to rally the other survivors. As they emerge from the jungle it becomes clear that only school pupils have escaped the crash. Singing is then heard and a small column of school choir boys, wearing their dark cloaks and hats, appear walking in twos. The choir is led by a boy named Jack. Military music plays and it is evident that this group has a strong structure with Jack as their leader.
The boys decide to appoint a chief. The vote goes to Ralph, and not Jack. Initially Ralph is able to steer the children (all of whom appear to be aged between about six and fourteen) towards a reasonably civilised and co-operative society. Only boys holding the conch are allowed to speak during meetings. The choir make wooden spears, further reinforcing their appearance as an army within the group. Critically Jack has a knife, capable of killing an animal.
The boys make fire using Piggy's spectacles/glasses and build shelters. After a while with no rescue in sight, the increasingly authoritarian and violence-prone Jack starts hunting and eventually finds a pig. Meanwhile however, he lets the fire, for which he and his "hunters" are responsible, go out, and a suddenly passing airplane misses them. Piggy chastises Jack, and Jack strikes him in retaliation, knocking his glasses off. One lens breaks on the rocks. The broken glasses become a central motif in the remainder of the film. Ralph is furious with Jack. Soon some of the children begin to talk of a beast that comes from the water. Jack, obsessed with this imagined threat, leaves the group to start a new tribe, one without rules, and playing and hunting all day. Soon more boys follow until only a few are left with Ralph, including Piggy.
Events reach a crisis when a boy named Simon finds a sow's head impaled on a stick and left by Jack as an offering to the Beast. He becomes hypnotized by the head that has flies swarming all around it. Simon then goes to the believed nest of the Beast, only to find a dead pilot under a hanging parachute. Simon then runs to Jack's camp to tell them the truth, only to be killed in the darkness by the frenzied children who mistake him for the Beast. The new group raid the old group's camp and steal piggy's glasses. Ralph goes to talk to the new group using the still-present power of the conch to get their attention. However when Piggy takes the conch they are not silent, as their rules require, but instead jeer. The boys push down a large rock and crush Piggy.
Ralph hides in the jungle. Jack and his hunters set fires to smoke him out, and Ralph staggers across the smoke covered island. Stumbling onto the beach, Ralph falls at the feet of a naval officer who stares in shock at the painted and spear-carrying savages that the children have become, before turning to his accompanying landing party. A small boy reaches up to the officer to check that he is real. The last scene shows Ralph weeping for the loss of innocence as the camera pulls back to show flames spreading across the island.
As with Golding's book, the pessimistic theme of the film is that fear, hate and violence are inherent in the human condition – even when innocent children are placed in seemingly idyllic isolation.
wedding night
".
The film was shot entirely in Puerto Rico
at Aguadilla, El Yunque
and on the island of Vieques. The boys in the cast had mostly not read the book, and actual scripting was minimal; scenes were filmed by explaining them to the boys, who then acted them out, with some of the dialogue improvised.
The NYC premiere of the film was attended by some of the original cast members followed by a photo shoot in Times Square (picture subsequently published in a Life Magazine article) and a party at Sardis' attended by others such as Zero Mostel.
.
, the film has an overall approval rating from critics of 100%, with an average
score of 7.9/10.
was nominated for the Golden Palm at the 1963 Cannes Film Festival
.
also released the DVD in the UK.
Film adaptation
Film adaptation is the transfer of a written work to a feature film. It is a type of derivative work.A common form of film adaptation is the use of a novel as the basis of a feature film, but film adaptation includes the use of non-fiction , autobiography, comic book, scripture, plays, and even...
of William Golding
William Golding
Sir William Gerald Golding was a British novelist, poet, playwright and Nobel Prize for Literature laureate, best known for his novel Lord of the Flies...
's novel of the same name
Lord of the Flies
Lord of the Flies is a novel by Nobel Prize-winning author William Golding about a group of British boys stuck on a deserted island who try to govern themselves, with disastrous results...
. It was directed by Peter Brook
Peter Brook
Peter Stephen Paul Brook CH, CBE is an English theatre and film director and innovator, who has been based in France since the early 1970s.-Life:...
and produced by Lewis M. Allen
Lewis M. Allen
Lewis Maitland Allen born 27 June 1922 Berryville, Virginia died 8 December 2003 New York City was an American film producer and Tony Award winning Broadway producer. He was married to screenwriter Jay Presson Allen...
, known since for producing films based on modern-classic novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....
s. The film was in production for much of 1961 though the film was not released until 1963. Golding himself supported the film. When Kenneth Tynan
Kenneth Tynan
Kenneth Peacock Tynan was an influential and often controversial English theatre critic and writer.-Early life:...
was a script editor for Ealing Studios
Ealing Studios
Ealing Studios is a television and film production company and facilities provider at Ealing Green in West London. Will Barker bought the White Lodge on Ealing Green in 1902 as a base for film making, and films have been made on the site ever since...
he commissioned a script of Lord of the Flies from Nigel Kneale
Nigel Kneale
Nigel Kneale was a British screenwriter from the Isle of Man. Active in television, film, radio drama and prose fiction, he wrote professionally for over fifty years, was a winner of the Somerset Maugham Award and was twice nominated for the British Film Award for Best Screenplay...
, but Ealing Studios closed in 1959 before it could be produced.
Plot
A montage forming the background in the opening credits sets the stage of the story. A group of English schoolchildren, living in the midst of a war (implied to be the Cold WarCold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
), are due to be evacuated due to the danger of remaining in England. Their airliner is shot down by briefly glimpsed fighter planes, and ditches near a remote island.
The main character Ralph (who later emerges as a reasonable and well-meaning personality) is then seen walking through a tropical forest, where he meets up with an intelligent and chubby boy, who admits that his school nickname was Piggy, but asks that Ralph should not repeat that. The two then go to the beach where they find a conch shell which Ralph blows to rally the other survivors. As they emerge from the jungle it becomes clear that only school pupils have escaped the crash. Singing is then heard and a small column of school choir boys, wearing their dark cloaks and hats, appear walking in twos. The choir is led by a boy named Jack. Military music plays and it is evident that this group has a strong structure with Jack as their leader.
The boys decide to appoint a chief. The vote goes to Ralph, and not Jack. Initially Ralph is able to steer the children (all of whom appear to be aged between about six and fourteen) towards a reasonably civilised and co-operative society. Only boys holding the conch are allowed to speak during meetings. The choir make wooden spears, further reinforcing their appearance as an army within the group. Critically Jack has a knife, capable of killing an animal.
The boys make fire using Piggy's spectacles/glasses and build shelters. After a while with no rescue in sight, the increasingly authoritarian and violence-prone Jack starts hunting and eventually finds a pig. Meanwhile however, he lets the fire, for which he and his "hunters" are responsible, go out, and a suddenly passing airplane misses them. Piggy chastises Jack, and Jack strikes him in retaliation, knocking his glasses off. One lens breaks on the rocks. The broken glasses become a central motif in the remainder of the film. Ralph is furious with Jack. Soon some of the children begin to talk of a beast that comes from the water. Jack, obsessed with this imagined threat, leaves the group to start a new tribe, one without rules, and playing and hunting all day. Soon more boys follow until only a few are left with Ralph, including Piggy.
Events reach a crisis when a boy named Simon finds a sow's head impaled on a stick and left by Jack as an offering to the Beast. He becomes hypnotized by the head that has flies swarming all around it. Simon then goes to the believed nest of the Beast, only to find a dead pilot under a hanging parachute. Simon then runs to Jack's camp to tell them the truth, only to be killed in the darkness by the frenzied children who mistake him for the Beast. The new group raid the old group's camp and steal piggy's glasses. Ralph goes to talk to the new group using the still-present power of the conch to get their attention. However when Piggy takes the conch they are not silent, as their rules require, but instead jeer. The boys push down a large rock and crush Piggy.
Ralph hides in the jungle. Jack and his hunters set fires to smoke him out, and Ralph staggers across the smoke covered island. Stumbling onto the beach, Ralph falls at the feet of a naval officer who stares in shock at the painted and spear-carrying savages that the children have become, before turning to his accompanying landing party. A small boy reaches up to the officer to check that he is real. The last scene shows Ralph weeping for the loss of innocence as the camera pulls back to show flames spreading across the island.
As with Golding's book, the pessimistic theme of the film is that fear, hate and violence are inherent in the human condition – even when innocent children are placed in seemingly idyllic isolation.
Cast
- James AubreyJames Aubrey (actor)James Aubrey was an English stage and screen actor. He trained for the stage at the Drama Centre London. He made his professional acting debut in a 1962 production of Isle of Children. Aubrey made his screen acting debut in the 1963 adaptation of Lord of the Flies. Aubrey performed with the Royal...
as Ralph - Tom Chapin as Jack
- Hugh Edwards as Piggy
- Roger Elwin as Roger
- Tom Gaman as Simon
- David Surtees as Sam
- Simon Surtees as Eric
Filming
The parents of those chosen are reported to have been provided copies of the novel, from which a commentary had been physically removed; those pages included describing the culmination of the hunt of a wild sow as an "ŒdipalOedipus
Oedipus was a mythical Greek king of Thebes. He fulfilled a prophecy that said he would kill his father and marry his mother, and thus brought disaster on his city and family...
wedding night
Consummation
Consummation is the initial sexual act made within a marriage.Consummation can also refer to:* Consummation , 1970 recordingSee also:* Consummation of days, event predicted in Daniel Chapter 12, verses 1-4...
".
The film was shot entirely in Puerto Rico
Puerto Rico
Puerto Rico , officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico , is an unincorporated territory of the United States, located in the northeastern Caribbean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of both the United States Virgin Islands and the British Virgin Islands.Puerto Rico comprises an...
at Aguadilla, El Yunque
El Yunque, Puerto Rico
The mountain lies completely within the boundaries of the El Yunque National Forest, part of the U.S. Forest Service, which is the only rainforest that belongs to the U.S. Forest Service. The peak itself is one of the highest in Puerto Rico, standing at 1,080 meters above sea level...
and on the island of Vieques. The boys in the cast had mostly not read the book, and actual scripting was minimal; scenes were filmed by explaining them to the boys, who then acted them out, with some of the dialogue improvised.
The NYC premiere of the film was attended by some of the original cast members followed by a photo shoot in Times Square (picture subsequently published in a Life Magazine article) and a party at Sardis' attended by others such as Zero Mostel.
Trivia
In the final scene the sailors rescuing the children are clearly marked as belonging to the British Navy destroyer HMS TroubridgeHMS Troubridge (R00)
HMS Troubridge was an T-class destroyer of the British Royal Navy that saw service during the Second World War.In 1943, she was sent to the Mediterranean, where she performed screening duties for major naval units...
.
Song
The song, heard throughout the film, of the boys singing is Kyrie Eleison which, translated from Greek, means "Lord, have mercy". It is an expression used in a prayer of the Christian liturgy.Differences between the book and the film
The film follows the book very faithfully, but there are a few differences:- In the book, the type of aircraft the boys are on is not specified; in the movie, the beginning montage shows the aircraft to be a De Havilland CometDe Havilland CometThe de Havilland DH 106 Comet was the world's first commercial jet airliner to reach production. Developed and manufactured by de Havilland at the Hatfield, Hertfordshire, United Kingdom headquarters, it first flew in 1949 and was a landmark in aeronautical design...
. The photos are edited for the Comet to have six engines, with 3 engines on each wing, a factual inaccuracy. This might be intended, showing that the boys might be flying to safety on a new aircraft type. - When they first light the fire on the hill, the fire doesn't spread over the jungle and thus the child that died from this fire is not shown.
- The killing of the mother sow is not shown, only the boys stabbing at something off-screen.
- Piggy does not make an emotional speech denouncing Jack and imagining a confrontation after the theft of the glasses.
- Ralph does not insult Piggy as much as in the novel.
- Piggy hardly ever cleans his spectacles.
- The boys spot a plane instead of a ship.
- Simon has very few lines throughout the film.
- Simon does not actually talk to the pig's head. Instead he stares at it for a long period of time, as the flies' buzzing grows increasingly louder.
- When Jack leaves the tribe the whole re-election scene is left out. Instead he just departs, asking who wants to come with him.
- At the end of the book Ralph talks to the naval officer telling him about the deaths of Simon and Piggy, and the officer responds that he would have expected better from British boys. In the film the officer stares aghast at the boys and does not speak.
- In the book, Simon is said to have black hair and a dark complexion; in the movie, he has blonde hair and is very fair. Golding's point in the book was to make him a Christ-like figure, and as Christ was from Jerusalem, he would have looked like this. However, in the film, he appears more like the modern, westernised view of a Christ figure.
- Similarly the appearance of Jack and Ralph differs from their description in the book in such details as height and hair colour.
- Simon's death is less violent.
- Sam and Eric were not painted when Ralph went to see them after they were forced to join Jack's tribe; in the movie they were.
- Piggy gets crushed by the great rock instead of being struck by it and falling forty feet, since the boys weren't on a very high place.
Critical response
The film received almost universally positive reviews; based on 12 reviews collected by Rotten TomatoesRotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
, the film has an overall approval rating from critics of 100%, with an average
Weighted mean
The weighted mean is similar to an arithmetic mean , where instead of each of the data points contributing equally to the final average, some data points contribute more than others...
score of 7.9/10.
Accolades
Peter BrookPeter Brook
Peter Stephen Paul Brook CH, CBE is an English theatre and film director and innovator, who has been based in France since the early 1970s.-Life:...
was nominated for the Golden Palm at the 1963 Cannes Film Festival
1963 Cannes Film Festival
-Jury:*Armand Salacrou *Rouben Mamoulian *Jacqueline Audry *Wilfrid Baumgartner *François Chavane *Jean De Baroncelli *Robert Hossein...
.
Home media
The Criterion Collection released it on DVD in America and Canada. Janus FilmsJanus Films
Janus Films is a film distribution company. It was one of the first distributors to bring what are now regarded as masterpieces of world cinema to the United States...
also released the DVD in the UK.
External links
- Criterion Collection essay by Peter BrookPeter BrookPeter Stephen Paul Brook CH, CBE is an English theatre and film director and innovator, who has been based in France since the early 1970s.-Life:...