capone666 In Search of the Castaways Having children on a rescue mission is smart because when they find the corpse their piercing shrieks will alert everyone.Unfortunately, the rescue effort in this adventure also includes a useless senior.Convinced that their shipwrecked father, Captain Grant (Jack Gwillim), is alive somewhere between South America and New Zealand, Robert (Keith Hamshere) and his sister Mary (Hayley Mills) recruit a Scottish lord (Wilfrid Hyde-White) to lead their expedition.Along for the ride are an elderly professor (Maurice Chevalier) and the Lord's son (Michael Anderson, Jr.).Together, the quintet faces an array of adversaries, from giant condors to Mother Nature's wrath, to a nefarious gunrunner (George Sanders).While the harrowing adventure is elongated by a red herring wrong turn, when Captain Grant's whereabouts is finally revealed this Disney adaptation of a Jules Verne tale really gets rolling.Mind you, once they find their father alive, there goes the insurance money. Green Lightvidiotreviews.blogspot.ca

Spikeopath In Search of the Castaways is a live action Disney feature film that stars Hayley Mills, Maurice Chevalier, Wilfrid Hyde-White, George Sanders, Keith Hamshere & Michael Anderson Jr. It's directed by Robert Stevenson and adapted for the screen by Lowell S. Hawley from Jules Verne's novel Captain Grant's Children. Plot sees Mills and Hamshere as the Grant siblings who along with Professor Paganel (Chevalier), Lord Glenarvan (White) & his son John (Anderson Jr), set off on a Worldwide search for their shipwrecked father.Standard Disney live action formula that is as fun as it is simple. The adventure sees the intrepid group have to deal with a number of Mother Earth's creatures and natural disasters. The roll call contains a condor, jaguar, crocodiles, avalanche, earthquake, lightning, volcano and a giant waterspout! While peril of the human kind comes courtesy of a hungry tribe of Maori's and a band of braggarts led by debonair dastardly George Sanders. Hyde-White is just terrific, as too is Wilfrin Bramble who shows up late in proceedings as a loony old prisoner of the Maori's.It's daft with a natural tongue in cheek vibe to it, but to expect anything less at the outset would be pure folly. 7/10

bkoganbing First of all let me say that any film with Maurice Chevalier will automatically get a look from me. Even though Hayley Mills was Walt Disney's number one star at the time, Chevalier's international status as a performer guaranteed him top billing. The younger cast members had a lot to do in keeping up with him.Robert Gwillim who is a sea captain and father to Hayley Mills and Keith Hamshere has been lost at sea for many years now and who knows where in this wide world with 5/6 of it covered by ocean. But a swallowed bottle with a note that was found in the belly of a shark by scientist Maurice Chevalier sends the three of them in search of Gwillim's employer Wilfrid Hyde-White to finance an expedition to search. Said note leads them first to South America and then to Australia because Maurice misreads the clues. He did that a lot in this film, an occupational hazard with eccentric scientists. This was the Magic Kingdom's second dealing with a Jules Verne story, the first being the classic 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea. Sad to say while In Search Of The Castaways has some interesting moments and in spots looks more like an Indiana Jones film, it does not make it above the juvenile level. Watching it today, I expected to see Harrison Ford ride in with bullwhip cracking to save the whole kit and kaboodle of them from villain George Sanders.Maurice's first mistake took them 10,000 miles out of their way. It's not often one gets a second chance there.

moonspinner55 Wonderful Jules Verne fantasy via Walt Disney has jolly, ne'er-do-well Frenchman Maurice Chevalier helping two children convince a ship's captain that the kids' father, a captain lost at sea, is shipwrecked on an island near South America. The journey begins, and soon the whole gang faces every form of a raging Mother Nature trying to reach the castaway. Hayley Mills is near the peak of her ladylike charms here, never lovelier than when singing "Castaway" under the stars by guitar or cooking breakfast with Chevalier in a treetop. Maurice himself is a wily coot, and Wilfred Hyde-White is brusquely amusing. Well-produced yarn with fine effects does tail off in the second-half, but there are many requisite Disney-adventure pleasures to be had. Enjoy it! *** from ****