The Long Voyage Home (1940)

6/10

evanston_dad13 February 2017

A strange, episodic film about a group of seamen who are charged with transporting munitions from a tropical port to England to help the British war effort.

These men aren't in the military themselves, which puts them in a sort of limbo. Though their mission is driven by the war, and their lives will be in danger from German U-boats prowling the sea they have to pass through, the war itself is only a vague specter in their actual lives, which are much more concerned with personal emotions and motives: homesickness being the primary one. The movie could serve as a representation for America as a country at the time of the film's release -- not directly involved in a war that one way or another was going to have a huge impact on it regardless.

John Ford gives the film a melancholy and even rather eerie vibe, helped in no small part by Gregg Toland's cinematography. But I can't say I ever really warmed to the film. Its episodic nature starts to feel monotonous after a while. We just start to learn something about a character and then the narrative moves along to yet another long drunken fistfight. Something about the movie remains deeply unsatisfying, even if one can appreciate the artistry that went into it.

John Wayne is now given top billing for this film, but he's part of a large ensemble cast without a real star. And oh my goodness, no one should have asked him to try a Swedish accent.

"The Long Voyage Home" was nominated for six Oscars, though it went home empty handed: Outstanding Production, Best Screenplay (Dudley Nichols), Best Cinematography (B&W), Best Film Editing (Sherman Todd), Best Original Score (Richard Hageman), and Best Special Effects (R.T. Layton, R.O. Binger, and Thomas T. Moulton).

Grade: B

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8/10

Nice blend of O'Neill, Nichols, and a touch of Ford

bkoganbing12 May 2006

The Long Voyage Home is a compilation film of four one act plays by Eugene O'Neill who some will argue is America's greatest dramatist. The man who did the stitching together of O'Neill's work about the crew of the S.S. Glencairn is Dudley Nichols and presiding over it all is the direction of John Ford.

Mr. Ford is usually someone who really puts an individual stamp on one of his movies. But the usual Ford trademarks are noticeably absent from The Long Voyage Home. Probably in mood and style the film of Ford's this comes closest to is The Informer. In fact J.M. Kerrigan is playing almost the same part in this as he did in The Informer.

One thing Ford always did was use the right kind of music to set the tone for a film. Those 19th century ballads like I Dream of Jeannie that work so well in something like Stagecoach are substituted for Harbor Lights. That song expresses so well the longing of a whole bunch of rootless men to find some kind of stability in their lives.

Eugene O'Neill spent many years at sea and the characters of these men on the S.S. Glencairn are drawn from his own youthful experience. Most of our planet is covered by water and no country owns it. It's just called the high seas and the seamen on it are an international fraternity, like the S.S. Glencairn crew. I've always felt that O'Neill was trying to say that if there's any salvation to be had in this old world, it's to be found on the salt water. It's the only place where all kinds of people really work for a common goal, stay alive and make the trip.

The original plays had a World War I background, but it has been updated for World War II. Especially in the part when the crew becomes convinced that Ian Hunter is some kind of spy. Certainly the second World War in 1940 gave the audiences some real interest. Ian Hunter may have given his career performance in this as Smitty. Turns out he's far from what everyone suspects.

Hard to believe that John Wayne would be in a film by one of our greatest dramatists. But the Duke holds his own in the ensemble. It's the only time he ever attempted some kind of accent and he pulls it off. But I'm sure he thought once was enough.

Wayne as Olsen is the innocent of the group, maybe the only time he's ever been that on the screen. The rest of the crew makes every effort to see he does in fact get home to Sweden. It turns out to cost one of them his life ultimately.

If you're any kind of depressed, The Long Voyage Home or any Eugene O'Neill is not good for your mental health. He's one pessimistic fellow that O'Neill. But his insights into our character and soul are always penetrating as they are in The Long Voyage Home.

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6/10

Lots of silly fistfights and drinking, but the threat of a story, too, and GREAT photography

secondtake21 July 2010

The Long Voyage Home (1940)

Any movie with Gregg Toland behind the camera is worth watching, with an emphasis on the visual experience. From Wuthering Heights (1939) to the Little Foxes, Ball of Fire, and Citizen Kane (all 1941), in three years, Toland lifted (again) the standards of the best Hollywood could do. This isn't just me saying this, and of course there are other great cinematographers, but if you've seen these movies you know they are exceptional. I falls right in the middle of this great stretch, and it has the revered John Ford directing, letting Toland do his thing, right from the first scene.

This is a solid, sometimes moving, sometimes dramatic movie, for sure. But the long first part is a composite of manly clichés: drinking, fighting, and womanizing. It's all in good fun, in a way, and the exoticness is made to sell movies. But there's quite a lot of nothing going on beyond seducing native women in some unnamed distant land. The dancing and fighting are filmed with Toland perfection, but it turns quickly to farce, or stereotype.

Thomas Mitchell is a lively Irishman in his best form, and John Wayne is an improbable Swede, and doesn't stand out much from the bunch except toward the end, when he is a block of wood with a bad accent. The story is a series of misunderstandings and friendships, but since the plot is made of four different Eugene O'Neill plays (from 20 years earlier), there is a little discontinuity to it all.

All of this is set during that strange cusp between World War II beginning in Europe and the U.S. still not joining in. The ship is carrying ammunition, and hints of things that really matter are given right at the start, with some news reports crackling into the seeming isolation of the ship. As the captain says as they are to depart from New York with the military cargo, "If it doesn't get there it'll be missed. But we won't."

Isolationism gets a more famous treatment in Casablanca two years later, after the Americans are already at war, so in a way, a big name movie like this had more potential influence on American sentiment. It's fascinating to see this Walter Wanger/John Ford/John Wayne collaboration after their breakthrough Stagecoach the year before (producer, director, star). But the stakes are raised, and the production level is much higher.

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Not a typical "John Wayne film",but still excellent

critic-27 August 1999

John Wayne is misleadingly top-billed ,presumably to bring in the crowds who thought they were going to see typical Wayne heroics in this one.He is actually part of an excellent ensemble cast in this film,which has seamlessly adapted by Dudley Nichols from a group of one-act plays by the great Eugene O'Neill. Nichols' writing is so good that unless you're an O'Neill expert,it is VERY difficult to tell where O'Neill leaves off and Nichols takes over,except perhaps in the episode involving British actor Ian Hunter (in the performance of a lifetime) as a presumed German spy. The plays,written in the early 1900's,have been updated to take place during WW II,but the propaganda angle is very tastefully handled and almost non-existent;in fact,here Nichols and director John Ford show great respect for the integrity of O'Neill's plays.

The cast is excellent,but Wayne actually hasn't got much to do in comparison with his other films,and this is a film of dialogue,not action.Perhaps that's why the previous reviewer found it interminable. [John Wayne uses a Swedish (!) accent in this movie,which he actually does quite well--don't laugh!] The most intense acting is done by Thomas Mitchell (Scarlett O'Hara's dad in "Gone With The Wind") and Barry Fitzgerald,who are actually the stars of the movie.And director John Ford shows us what a true master of his craft he is by equalling Hitchcock's accomplishment in "Lifeboat" in keeping the action confined to a small space without making it seem tiresome. The back-and-white photography is stunningly good--the best American photography in a black-and-white 1940's American film,aside from "Citizen Kane",of course.

John Wayne fans shouldn't pass this one up,and all non-fans should still enjoy this fine film.

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7/10

Splendid Ford movie about crew members aboard a merchant steamer attempting to get home in 1939

ma-cortes16 December 2008

The talented cast acts this excellent screen rendition of Eugene O'Neill's play (it's adapted from three of his one-act plays) about crew sailors aboard a freighter steamer called ¨Glencairn¨ carrying charge containing war-smuggling , TNT , explosives from US to England , at the beginning WWII . This film's opening prologue states : "With their hates and desires men are changing the face of the earth - but they cannot change the Sea . Men who live on the Sea never change - for they live in a lonely world apart as they drift from one rusty tramp steamer to the next, forging the life of Nations" . The crew talk themselves and contend each other , but also save each other from bombing and risks . At the ending terminates with an epilogue that states : 'Some men like Ole and the Driscolls come a and go and the others live and die and the Yanks and Smittys leave their memories- but for the others the long voyage never ends' .

This dramatic film is a classic Ford , displaying his usual themes as strong issues in many films , such as emotionalism , partnership , friendship and unlovable camaraderie between the sailors . However , it seems to be sometimes excessively sentimental and looks over-melodramatic during the reading letters from Smittys . The sailors show a nostalgic longing for past things and old values and their own homes : Sweden , Ireland , England . Straightforward acting by John Wayne as a Swedish sailor named Ole , he was to star habitually for Ford after the director rose his career from B Western in ¨Poverty Row¨ productions , with his greatest hit , 'Stagecoach' . There's magnificent secondary cast playing the seamen , as Thomas Mitchell as a sympathetic sailor , Ian Hunter as the drunk and unbalanced Smittys , Mildred Natwick as a swindler prostitute , Rafaela Ottiano as a tropical woman , Jack Pennick , a Ford's usual , among others . Barry FitzGerald , who plays the character of humorous cook ¨Cocky¨ , and Arthur Shields, who played Donkeyman , were brothers in real life . They also appeared together in director John Ford's The quiet man (1952).

Descriptive , evocative black-and-white cinematography by Gregg Toland (Citizen Kane) , plenty of lights and shades , reflecting loneliness , dark suspicion , frightening from crew and the smoky , greasy , sweaty atmosphere from merchant ship . Cinematographer Gregg Toland's photographing of this movie utilized high contrast lighting . The picture belongs the best period when John Ford (1895-1973) made a rich variety of stories and his reputation rightly rests on his work in the 1940s , as ¨Grapes of wrath¨ , ¨How green was my valley¨ , ¨Fugitive¨ , ¨They were expendable¨ , ¨My darling Clementine¨ and the Cavalry trilogy : ¨Fort Apache¨ , ¨She wore a yellow ribbon¨ , ¨Rio Grande¨. Rating : Awesome , above average , a major triumph for Ford and Wayne . It's a must see from John Ford enthusiasts and John Wayne fans.

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7/10

A set of sea plays

Igenlode Wordsmith7 June 2020

I was expecting this film about a tramp steamer with a cargo of high explosives to be a wartime drama along the lines of "San Demetrio"; in fact, the war is pretty peripheral. Even when the ship does come under attack, somewhere around the middle of the picture, she apparently escapes unscathed via means unspecified (did the enemy simply run out of bombs after missing with all of them?) It's really a story about life on the lower decks, with the officers making distant appearances and the wartime background intruding from time to time, but with the main focus on the relationships among the crew.

According to the credits, it was adapted from a set of "sea plays" by Eugene O'Neill, which accounts for the very episodic feel of the film. It's not really a complete story; it's a set of individual isolated incidents, some of which are never really explained (all the signalling with torches, for instance, which is apparently not anything to do with undercover spies -- I actually assumed there were two ships in the opening scene, one being the tramp steamer and the other a British naval vessel!) On the other hand, it did succeed in several places in making me care about the characters; I was convinced that Smitty was being falsely accused, and desperate by the end for Ole to escape successfully from seaboard life as his shipmates are determined that he should do, despite the heavy foreshadowing otherwise.

The film was billed as "John Wayne in Eugene O'Neill's The Long Voyage Home", but that's presumably a retrospective attempt to cash in on Wayne's name; the lead actors are Thomas Mitchell as the burly Irishman Driscoll, and Ian Hunter as the middle-class Englishman who is the odd one out among his cheery companions. John Wayne plays Ole, the simple Swedish farmboy whose role is largely passive and monosyllabic, though he gets a good scene where he talks nostalgically about his home during the final drunken bar-crawl.

There are no very great surprises here, and the pace is quite slow -- extremely slow at the beginning, which is presumably intended to indicate the heat and tedium of a tropical night. I can see these individual 'episodes' working better in the original format as one-act plays, each with its definitive ending, than as an attempt at one continuing story. I didn't find the film quite successful (not nearly so much so as the English production "San Demetrio, London"), but on the other hand, it's not entirely mediocre -- and it's not as gung-ho as an actual war film would probably have been. (The shadowy role of the war is explained, in retrospect, by the fact that the source material was written twenty years earlier!)

I'd probably rate it 7/10: worth taping from TV, not worth paying for :-p

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10/10

Extraordinarily moving drama from two master dramatists

JimB-422 October 2001

Reportedly, John Ford's film of The Long Voyage Home was Eugene O'Neill's favorite of all filmed versions of his plays, and it is no task to see why. The worlds of Ford and O'Neill overlap in their use of sentiment, tragicomedy, and the sons of old Ireland. This episodic collection of stories, taken from several short plays written by O'Neill and based on his own seafaring life, does what both O'Neill and Ford do best--unveil the poetry and tragedy of simple men. Granted, Ford outsentimentalizes O'Neill, who can be far darker than Ford ever dared, but he comes by it honestly--no Capra-corn here. The photography and sound bring a hyper-reality to this tale of merchant sailors, fearful for their lives, argumentative yet loving, full of weakness but capable of strength and honor. The performances are uniformly splendid. John Wayne, in a supporting role, does quite well with an unusual part, a lonely Swedish sailor, and his accent is much better than he is usually given credit for. But this is no star vehicle. The ship is the star, and the lives of its men resound with meaning and melancholy. An extraordinary film experience, especially for the patient and thoughtful among us.

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7/10

Handsome looking and impressively bleak war-drama

Red-Barracuda23 October 2017

The director-actor partnership of John Ford and John Wayne was famous for producing many films. This is the one they made after their breakthrough western Stagecoach (1939), the movie which made Wayne a star, while cementing Ford's reputation as one of the top directors in Hollywood. It could be argued that this film is even more notable for being the one in which cinematographer Greg Toland tried out new lenses that would allow for greater depth focus, something he would perfect in his next film, Citizen Kane (1941). The use of deep-focus in that movie, along with the sterling cinematography contributing considerably to its all-time classic status; so the experiments that Toland tried in The Long Voyage Home have to be considered pretty significant as a dry run for the Orson Welles classic. It's not an especially not plot-driven film and is one which relies more on character and atmosphere. Set in the very early stages of World War II (well before the Americans had even joined the conflict), the focus is on the crew of a cargo ship which sails from the West Indies to Baltimore, picks up a load of dynamite and then heads over the Atlantic to the conflict zone in Europe. It consequently becomes a target of the Nazis who were routinely attacking merchant navy vessels heading over to the UK. While the war backdrop is important, this is as much a look at the seafaring life and the loneliness inherent in it. We have several characters, including an Irishman, a Swede and an Englishman and we follow the episodic dramas they face along their journey, including some suspenseful scenes involving one character being accused of being an enemy spy, the violence of a sea storm and the horror of an air attack from Nazi warplanes.

It's a film which seems to have a pretty divided opinion. On the one hand, many consider it one of Ford's classic films, while others find it uneventful and tedious. I have to say I found myself closer to the first category and thought it to be a pretty involving movie. The lack of a dynamic plot never really concerned me at all and I felt the feel and tone of the thing was what it was all about. Toland's cinematography was very good with some nicely captured atmospheric sequences of the ship and men at sea. It is admittedly a rather bleak film and it does have a somewhat downbeat ending but these factors are plus points really, as it ensures that the material is presented in a manner which feels true. It does have to be said that, despite having top-billing, John Wayne is really no more than a bit player here. It may be just as well as he sports a pretty ropey Swedish accent which sounded quite strange (although back in those days, odd accents in movies were par-for-the-course as most people in the audience wouldn't have been able to tell if they were any good or not!). Although it was quite refreshing to see him in a different kind of role than he normally would appear in, it did feel that he was nevertheless somewhat miscast as a gentle, un-heroic Swedish farm boy. To all intents and purposes the lead actor here is Thomas Mitchell as the Irishman Driscoll; he was a character actor who appeared in many roles, including the aforementioned Stagecoach, and he was very good here. The film as a whole was a very decent movie and definitely showcases the fact that there was some talented people involved with this one.

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9/10

One of John Ford's best. Maybe THE best.

zetes15 May 2002

The Long Voyage home is not a typical film from this period. It differs in that it focuses on an ensemble cast instead of on a star. That's common nowadays, but not back then. Ford's Stagecoach, made the previous year, had quite an ensemble cast, but the film was always focused on Ringo and Dallas. Here, John Wayne is just one of the stars. Thomas Mitchell, who played Doc Washburn in Stagecoach, has a role that's as big as Wayne's in Voyage. Others are as prominent.

The plot is also pretty tenuous and episodic. And, unlike most films of the time, the focus was not on a goal, but just on the events and lives of the seaman aboard the Glencairn. We see them sail through the war-torn Atlantic, between the U.S. and Europe. They have fun, they fight, they talk about home. It's all rather gentle and beautiful, very subtle. The script is great, which is probably due to Eugene O'Neil, for of whose plays this film is based on (they are blended together seamlessly).

The actors are marvelous. Mitchell and Wayne are probably the best known, but there are also Ian Hunter, Barry Fitzgerald, John Qualen, Ward Bond, Mildred Natwick, and many other great character actors. John Wayne was probably the draw, considering how popular Stagecoach had made him, but, as I said, his role is not out in the front. In fact, he doesn't have many lines. His schtick is that he is a Swede who can't speak English well, so he is generally pretty quiet (Wayne can't muster the best Swedish accent, either, so that's kind of a good thing!). He has one great scene where he has some long bits of dialogue. But even without the dialogue, he emotes so well in his face. I knew his character intimately by the end of the film. We don't often think of Wayne as a great actor, but he certainly was. Although The Searchers probably contains his best role, The Long Voyage Home would certainly be worth a major mention when talking about his career.

If you could say that there is a single "star" of this film, that would have to be Greg Tolland. Of course, he photographed Citizen Kane in the next year, as well as Ford's Best Picture winning How Green Was My Valley and The Grapes of Wrath. The cinematography is some of the most impressive to be found in the American cinema. John Ford himself is just as much the star of The Long Voyage Home. He definitely put his heart into this one. The direction is beautiful, artful. It is as good here as it is in The Grapes of Wrath, My Darling Clementine, and The Searchers, that is, it is one of his very best films, if not THE best. To date, it's the only Ford film that made me shed tears. 10/10.

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6/10

Dramatic and Episodic Sea Tale.

rmax3048235 May 2008

Warning: Spoilers

Maybe one of the reasons this is less successful than most of the other movies John Ford was directing about this time is that the other productions were so darned good. "The Long Voyage Home" isn't without interest but it doesn't measure up to the rest of Ford's work. Based on a couple of Eugene O'Neill's short plays, it gives us four patched-together stories: a drunken brawl aboard a small freighter in a Caribbean port, the death of a crew member (Yank, Ward Bond) and his funeral, the heroic redemption of Smitty the suspected spy, and the heroic struggle of a handful of inebriated men to get Ole (John Wayne) aboard a ship for home in the face of temptation.

I haven't read that much of Eugene O'Neill's work and seen little of it performed but I get the impression his plays are, by necessity, largely literary works involving a kind of pointillism in which secrets and character traits are revealed little by little, mostly through dialog about psychology. "Strange Interlude" had characters breaking the fourth wall and addressing the audience directly, explaining their REAL thoughts. This is hardly Ford territory.

Not that Ford and O'Neill held each other in low esteem. They were two driven Irish-Americans and shared the occasional drunken crying jag. Dudley Nichols wrote the script and seems to have preserved the parts of the four stories that would most appeal to Ford -- funerals, comic fist fights, camaraderie, and booze. Ford directed it all with aplomb and to the extent that the stories hang together it's because we follow the same characters through all of them, so we get to know the men and their quirks.

The acting, alas, is not all it could be. Some of the more seasoned are fine -- Barry Fitzgerald, John Qualen, Thomas Mitchell, J. M. Kerrigan. But others --. John Wayne should never appear in a role requiring any kind of accent. He sounds about as Swedish as moo goo gai pan and he seems self-aware enough to be embarrassed about it. And Ward Bond should stick with his sidekick roles and never again assay a dramatic part. He's much better at imitating a whinnying horse than a dying and hallucinating sailor. Ian Hunter as Smitty, the suspected spy, is not bad in an important role -- just bland. The scene in which his shipmates find a stack of letters supposed to be in code and read them aloud, only to realize that they are love letters from his wife, must have been borrowed and revamped for "Destination Tokyo".

That pretty much gets any weaknesses out of the way. James Basevi's set decoration is splendid and Gregg Toland's photography can't be beat for indirect lighting and long shadows on wet decks and cobblestone streets. Ford handles the direction as well as he ever has, which is to say with efficiency and sometimes even poetry. Still, overall, it's a gloomy film with little comedy and Ford probably had trouble with the simple fact that these sailors actually hate the vocation they're hopelessly bound to. None has a family. None has any aspirations beyond further drudgery leading to the next paycheck. And the loyalty they feel is only to their mates, not to their calling.

Worth seeing if only for the great visuals.

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2/10

Not A Typical John Wayne Movie

sddavis6315 May 2011

John Wayne plays anything but a typical John Wayne role in this film. Known mostly as a cowboy at this stage in his career, and later as a soldier, here he plays Ole - a Swedish sailor on a British merchant marine vessel in the early days of World War II. I mention that because many people are likely drawn to this film to see Wayne in a non-typical role. He does a good enough job with it I suppose, but although he receives top billing he isn't really the star of the movie. That status probably belong to Thomas Mitchell as Ole's Irish shipmate Driscoll.

Most of this movie is set on board ship and generally the shipboard scenes are not bad in terms of realism. The movie is dialogue driven rather than action driven - although there are also a number of stretches where there's precious little dialogue. There's nothing particularly wrong with a dialogue driven and character driven movie, but there does have to be a worthwhile and attention getting story to go along with it, and in that sense I felt this movie was seriously lacking. I found little interesting in this. Aside from the story of men at sea who dream of home there didn't really seem to be much to this. There were a couple of moments of drama - when Smitty (Ian Hunter) is accused of being a German spy and when the German planes attack the ship - but these moments pass very quickly, and I didn't find that there was enough to the rest of the story to keep me truly focused on the story. (In fact, to be honest, there came a point when I found myself wondering when this would end.) Suffice to say, this really didn't strike home with me.

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8/10

One of the Best O'Neill Adaptations

CinePete30 September 2019

Dark in tone, primarily enclosed on sound-stage, no major stars -- and Eugene O'Neill not an easy transfer from stage to screen -- this project does not have much working in its favour. But there's a great team at work here -- cameraman Gregg Toland, writer Dudley Nichols, director John Ford -- and an Irish-inflected ensemble, much like a troupe of players transported from Dublin's Abbey Theatre.

The Long Voyage Home compresses four short O'Neill plays into a single narrative, updated from World War I to the onset of World War II. The plays have been softened in language, and the overriding doom-and despair motif is lightened with bits of Irish-style shenanigans. Still, the considerable fidelity to O'Neill's text is one of the pleasures of viewing.

We are seldom outside the studio soundstage, but even with process shots and projections, the filmmakers still create the illusion of the open sea. The storm sequences have considerable impact, even for the contemporary viewer. Some sequences here are worthy of Ford's earlier spectacle The Hurricane, albeit on a smaller scale.

Toland's striking camerawork, with its deep focus and Expressionist lighting, gives the film a foreboding, unsettling quality, well suited to the precarious nature of the wartime voyage from the West Indies to England.

There's a likeable interplay among the actors. I get a bit tired of John Quelan with his whining falsetto brogue, and to an extent smart aleck Barry Fitzgerald with his supercilious chin. But I engage easily with Thomas Mitchell's bossy, streetwise good nature, and especially Ward Bond, who, contrary to his usual gruff, rough-edged manner, gets some soulful moments as the unlucky sailor named Yank.

Youthful John Wayne is surprisingly right as the Swedish sailor on his long voyage home, perhaps the pivotal member of this crew, attached to one another for better or for worse. He and dockside bar-maid Mildred Natwick share a few poignant moments in the last part of the film.

From a modern perspective, some sentiments and attitudes are incorrectly expressed, but in the period, Long Voyage Home admirably gives O'Neill a measure of 'realism' and respect from Hollywood. It is the only O'Neill film to be nominated for a Best Picture Oscar (and 5 other awards).

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7/10

Ford and Wayne. it's a western... on the high seas.

ksf-24 September 2020

SO many big hollywood stars, and so many oscar nominations in this story by O'Neill. John wayne, Thomas Mitchell, irishman Barry Fitzgerald. director John Ford and Wayne were old buddies by now, so they knew the ropes, so to speak. when a ship is bringing dangerous cargo to the war effort in London, the captain allows the locals in the west indies to bring booze and girls aboard. and when they sail, everything that can go wrong does go wrong. the weather. injured men. and when one of the men acts strangely, they think he's a spy. and they confront him. although he got top billing, Wayne has a really minor role during the first hour. but has a big scene right near the end. It's all pretty good. no big surprises, but good story. Directed by john ford, who made TONS of films with J. Wayne, and won FOUR oscars!

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5/10

Painfully slow movie, can't recommend it

costellorp29 January 2017

This movie is the dark side of "The Quiet Man," except that John Wayne's role is very small here. First, there are about a dozen actors in this movie who later were in supporting roles in The Quiet Man. However, John Ford had not figured out what to do with these wonderful character actors to make them shine in this film. In this movie he has them overplay their parts to the cringe point for the audience. Perhaps it played better in 1940, but I think that Ford just got it wrong here. Consider how excellently acted "Stagecoach" was, and that was 1939, the year prior to this movie. While there are a few good moments here (Ward Bond has a terrific scene, as does Ian Hunter), this movie is painfully slow. We debated turning it off a few times, but thought that it must get better because it had such good reviews on IMDb. Wrong! Finally, we fast-forwarded it on the DVR, and that was the right speed to watch the end. We don't recommend it, unless you insist on seeing all the actors from "The Quiet Man" when they were 12 years younger.

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good to see after reading

dianerosenberger13 January 2003

At 105 minutes, it's not really that long. After reading O'Neill's The Long Voyage Home and Other Plays* for a drama-reading group, it was really interesting to see how the four one act plays were blended into a movie. The movie box says, "O'Neill considered it the favorite of all his filmed works." Reading then seeing was a great way to appreciate these very early plays of this important American playwright.

(*Dover Thrift Editions, 1995)

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7/10

An unusually straight movie for Ford

funkyfry16 December 2002

One of Ford's better (and lesser known) films, notable for the restraint exercised towards the characters and story. It is about a ship traveling through dangerous waters to bring war supplies to besieged England, and centers on the conflicts, dreams and sufferings of the sailors who inhabit the ship. Wayne does a good job as the big Swede, mostly by not talking much. Ward Bond does a great job with his death scene. It was cool how Ford allowed the audience to become more and more annoyed and frustrated as the situation at the film's climax reaches its conclusion.

Not market with the overbearing sentiment that hobbles so much of Ford's output (IMHO).

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7/10

A fine John Ford classic.

jazza92316 April 2010

79/100. John Ford combined four of Eugene O'Neill stories into this film. He does a great job directing and does exceptional developing the characters, as he usually does. The cinematography is stunning, the use of light and shadows is so effective. The score is superb. Good cast, although casting John Wayne is a Swede was a curious choice. Although Wayne doesn't hurt the overall effect of the film, he doesn't help it either. Thomas Mitchell, Barry Fitzgerald, Mildred Natwick and John Qualen stand out in the cast. A beautifully done film. The Long Voyage Home was nominated for six Academy Awards, including Best Picture. Not surprisingly, cinematography as well.

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10/10

My first ever Ford/Wayne film.

morrison-dylan-fan26 August 2012

Warning: Spoilers

Despite being impressed by John Ford's epic Silent Western The Iron Horse,and finding some of John Wayne's (aka:the man who the Hip-Hop world would call:Da Duke!) "Lonestar" movies to be cheerful,easy going flicks,I have somehow completely missed ever taking a look at Ford and Wayne's highly celebrated collaboration's.With being in the mood of trying to pick up a good deal.

I recently decided to search round on Ebay in the hope of finding some interesting DVD's being sold at a good price.Getting near the end of the first page,I was thrilled to discover that a rare Region 1 boxset contains a number of Ford/Wayne films,some of which have not been brought out as individual DVD's was on sale for 5 more minutes without a single bid for 7 pounds!.Finding myself the only bidder for the item,I began to get prepared for at last taking a look at this amazing collaboration for the very first time.

View on the film:

Starting the film with a 5 minute scene featuring not one single word of dialogue,director John Ford tremendously throws all of the typical "high-sea" adventures overboard,to instead lead the SS Glencaim into murky Film Noir waters.

Using the crews "sudden mission" to create a strong sense of doubt amongst themselves,Ford wonderfully shows the bond that each of the terrific ensemble have,to slowly start to developing tears as they look around them and see nothing but sea and betrayal,with one of the most gripping sections of the movie being all of the Glencaim crew,suspecting that loyal crew member Smitty, (played by a great,uneasy Ian Hunter) may in fact be a Nazi,who is giving details away about the cargo that the ship is carrying.

Smartly going with a soft Swedish accent that never becomes a parody,John Wayne gives a terrific,understated performance as new recruit Olsen.

Staying on an equal footing with the rest of the ensemble cast,Wayne shows Olsen to be someone who is drastically using his young wits,to try and stop the very bowels of the ship from being torn apart by the turmoil of its own crew,and also doing well at using Olsen's youth and inexperience as a contrast to doubtful and more "mature" crew members of Glencaim.

In his elegant adaptation of not 1,but 4! Plays by writer Eugene O'Neil,screenwriter Dudley Nichols superbly never makes the various sources for the screenplay feel disjointed,but to instead smoothly join them,to create an unforgettable,down beat,brutal journey across the oceans.

For the scenes before all of the crew start getting a sense of paranoia and dread,Nichols shows the ocean to have a vice like grip on the lives of everyone,with almost all of the conversations that the loyal gang have on the ship being about its day to day running,and some slightly shady activates taking place on the ships port.

Checking up for trivia related to this marvellous film,I was extremely pleased to learn,that when talking about the movie to bio writer Maurice Zolotow,Wayne had said that: "Usually it would be Ford who helped the cinematography get his compositions for maximum effect,but in this case it was Gregg Toland who helped ford.Voyage is about as beautifully photographed a movie as there has ever been."

From the very first scene of the ship heading straight into the looming black clouds,Citizen Kane and The Westerner cinematography Gregg Toland creates one of the most dazzling and beautifully lit films that I have ever seen Fully displaying the brilliant deep focus style which he would expand upon in his next film,(Kane).

Toland uses the dept of field to build a tense, atmospheric feeling of isolation and paranoia,as the hope for the crew of reaching shore slowly deteriorates.Allowing the movie to fully sink in the Noir atmosphere,Toland expertly has high contrast lighting from outside the ships windows,be the only "light" to shine in the interior scenes,to show that despite a full crew,the SS Glencaim is ruled by shadows,fear and a haunting dread which will have a grip on the crew for the rest of their lives.

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7/10

Incredible direction

HotToastyRag25 January 2022

One of the greatest directors of the silver screen, John Ford once again filmed a masterpiece in The Long Voyage Home. The movie isn't actually that good, but the direction is fantastic. He uses interesting and inventive camera angles on the ship, and the storm sequence is so believable, I'd almost say I didn't know how he did it. If you're a Ford fan but have only seen his westerns, rent this one. It's a little slow, but that's to be expected. Life on a ship can be very slow, and as the title suggests, it's a long voyage. Plus, it's a story by Eugene O'Neill, so that's a guarantee of slowness.

The cast includes John Wayne and Ward Bond, of course, and Thomas Mitchell as the lead. John Qualen, Barry Fitzgerald, Ian Hunter, Arthur Shields, and Rafaela Ottiano make up the supporting cast. You'll also see Mildred Natwick for a few minutes in a role she never played again: a prostitute! You might notice John Wayne hardly talks during this movie, but he had a reason for it: he plays someone Swedish, and he was very self-conscious about putting on a Swedish accent. Isn't that cute?

If you have patience, this is a staple of classic film direction. If you'd rather watch something a little quicker paced or with a shorter running time, you can check out Ford's masterpiece The Hurricane. It's amazing the effects he created with water and no computer graphics.

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10/10

A sea tragedy, minus the iceberg

dexter-1026 May 2000

This film is all that a film should be for it dictates that the human condition is in itself dramatic and tragic enough without exaggerated theatrics. This sea tragedy needs no iceberg. What it does contain is excellent cinematography by Gregg Toland, superb direction by John Ford and a superior script based on the plays of Eugene O'Neill. The drama developes simply from a ship being in the war zone during World War Two with a full cargo of ammunition and no escort or weapon for protection--just a twenty-five percent bonus for the crew. The acting is about as good as acting can be: Arthur Shields (as Donkey Man) and Thomas Mitchell (as Aloysius Driscoll) never waver in the characters they portray. They are, without question, so realistic that they live beyond the movie. In effect, they are more than characters on film, they are universal humans trying to make order out of chaos, even if they must create chaos to do so. The main character is the "Glencairn" itself, the ship in the film. Like Greek tragedy, it is the chorus about which the dramatic action occurs. The long voyage home for some of the characters goes on and on, but the long voyage for the "Glencairn" continues like so many other rust buckets. In World War Two, constant danger and possible disaster waited just outside every harbor.

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7/10

so-so

KyleFurr219 September 2005

This is just an average John Ford film and he made a lot better movies than this one. This was made in the same year as The Grapes Of Wrath and it's hard to believe this was nominated for best picture. This movie has a great cast that stars John Wayne, Thomas Mitchell, Ward Bond and Barry Fitzgerald. This movie came out one year after Stagecoach, which made Wayne a star but he didn't become a big star until Red River eight years later. This is set in England during World War II and they are on a boat that is about to dock. Their really isn't a plot to the movie and it's just a bunch of little segments. It's just an OK Ford film but he made some better ones then this one.

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5/10

The Long Snooze

kenjha22 November 2006

Based on plays by Eugene O'Neill, this drama focuses on a group of sailors on a ship during the war. It is beautifully filmed by famed cinematographer Gregg Toland and has Ford's usual visual flair. Wayne gives a fine performance as a Swedish (!) farm boy who is eager to get home. The cast includes familiar faces such as Mitchell, Bond, Fitzgerald, and Natwick. With such good pedigree behind it, one would expect a masterpiece but this is a big disappointment. It does not have much of a plot and there are too many scenes of Irish sailors boozing it up. It is long and dull, testing the viewer's patience. This acclaimed film came out the same year as another overrated Ford film, "The Grapes of Wrath."

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8/10

Homerific

slokes16 April 2007

An expressionistic classic featuring John Wayne as a Swede? Can it be?

"The Long Voyage Home" may fall just short of classic status, but it is one of Hollywood's most visually expressionistic films, a tone poem of shadow and light presented by director John Ford and cinematographer Gregg Toland. That is indeed the Duke himself, John Wayne, playing a Swedish hayseed named Ole Olsen who the other sailors aboard his ship want to see safely en route to home. He's not Meryl Streep as it turns out, but you will want to see this powerhouse example of Hollywood art anyway for Toland's camera-work, the ensemble acting, and Dudley Nichols' seamless adaptation of Eugene O'Neill's four one-act plays.

O'Neill's sea yarns are transported to the then-present. World War II is underway, and the Glencairn transports ammunition to England for the fight against Hitler. Will Ole return home? What is the secret behind quiet English sailor Smitty (Ian Hunter)? Why are women bearing baskets of fruit not to be trusted? Why is Driscoll (Thomas Mitchell) so suspicious of that bartender?

Pauline Kael once wrote up "Long Voyage Home" by way of addressing another film shot by Gregg Toland the following year, "Citizen Kane." Both Ford and "Kane" director Orson Welles took the unusual step of sharing their titles card with Toland, a show of respect for what Toland's eye brought to their films. I'd say Toland brought more to "Long Voyage Home" than he did to "Kane," as every shot seems suffused with a tenseness and mood that at the very least speaks as eloquently to the drama on screen as any line of dialogue or actor's performance.

That's true from the opening shot, a wordless pan shot of the Glencairn drifting across the water as women in the foreground gyrate sensuously to an unseen music. The images are contrasted with those of Glencairn sailors looking pent-up and frustrated. Are the women really there on the shore, or just being imagined by the crew? It's a classic bit of expressionist ambiguity that, once established, carries through for the rest of the film.

Take the case of Smitty, a fellow who no one can much figure out as he keeps to himself, at least until he is finally fingered as a likely German spy in a sequence that might appear contrived had not Nichols, Toland, and Hunter made it quite diabolically real. Ian Hunter is not a well-known actor today, but he carries the film as long as he's around, especially while confronted with his apparent treachery. Watching him grimace and shake with fury as his secret is slowly, gut-wrenchingly exposed is the strongest scene in this very strong film, and once the film moves beyond Smitty, it never quite recovers. Hunter also appears in "Adventures Of Robin Hood" as a similar figure of dual identities, and I won't make the mistake of underestimating him again.

I only wish Thomas Mitchell, the Oscar winner from Ford's "Stagecoach" the previous year, had brought some restraint to his playing of Driscoll here. Barry Fitzgerald and John Qualen, Ford vets both, seem to catch his overacting bug. It's not pretty, especially to those of us who have seen all three give better work.

Wayne, however, is effective despite his dodgy accent, and it's interesting to see him in a film, just a year after his breakthrough in "Stagecoach," where he is presented to us as one of the gang, something of a follower and not a lone-wolf leader. I don't normally associate Wayne with amiable go-alongness, but he carries it here.

John Ford is pretty much the Shakespeare of cinema, effortlessly moving from comedy to tragedy within a single scene, and "Long Voyage Home," while not perfect, makes a strong case for his visionary mastery.

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7/10

Excellent. A John Ford seafaring masterpiece.

michaelRokeefe28 April 2007

Warning: Spoilers

Director John Ford gathers friends as writer Dudley Nichol distills four classic Eugene O'Neill one-act plays into a very interesting tale of men at sea. A tightly knit crew aboard a merchant ship has different reasons to be on the sea. Some just for the money; some to try and forget memories and some to avoid trouble on dry land. The shipmates grumble when they realize they will dock to take aboard wartime ammunitions. John Wayne plays Ole, a young Swede that decides to take his pay and sail home to his family's farm. Part of the crew try to keep Ole sober on shore leave, so he can buy that ticket for home. Otherwise the seamen will get stinking drunk before signing on for another long voyage. Photographed beautifully in black and white; with a well crafted original score. The cast is a who's who featuring: Barry Fitzgerald, Thomas Mitchell, Ward Bond, John Qualen, Ian Hunter and Joe Sawyer.

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5/10

Long and Dull, BUT Great Acting (Particularly Wayne)

Bob-4520 March 2001

This is the movie to show anybody who doesn't believe John Wayne could be a great actor. You actually fear for his character, the innocent "Oly" Olsen when it appears he's about to be shanghied. Certainly great acting from the entire cast (Thomas Mitchell and Arthur Shields, particularly), but Wayne is incredible. Nevertheless, be prepared for a LONG, SLOW "voyage home".

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