Wake of the Red Witch
Tags: violence, romantic, flashback

Plot synopsis:
The film is about an ongoing rivalry between two men of the sea: Mayrant Sidneye (Luther Adler) owner of the shipping company Batjak Limited, and Captain Ralls (John Wayne).
The first part of the film depicts Captain Ralls as the ruthless master (captain) of the Red Witch, Batjak's flagship. For reasons not entirely clear, Ralls deliberately wrecks and sinks the Red Witch and its cargo of gold bullion worth five million dollars. He escapes a charge of barratry when Batjak unexpectedly withdraws its complaint.
Ralls and his first mate Sam Rosen (Gig Young) spend some time as fishermen on a schooner. They eventually follow a treasure map to an uncharted island. They are greeted on the island by Sidneye, the map turning out to be a ploy to lure Ralls to the island so Sidneye can deal with Ralls in his own way.
The film then uses a series of flashbacks to describe how Ralls and Sidneye first met and how Ralls became captain of the Red Witch. Specifically, it is revealed that both Ralls and Sidneye fell in love with the same beautiful woman, Angelique (Gail Russell). When Ralls accidentally killed Angelique's uncle, Angelique married Sidneye even though Ralls is the man she really loved. However, when Angelique became ill and was dying, she somehow got word to Ralls and he returned to the island. Angelique dies in his arms soon after he arrives. It is strongly hinted that Ralls's deliberate sinking of the Red Witch was an act of revenge against Sidneye for depriving him of the woman he loved.
After the flashbacks the film returns to the present. Ralls and Sidneye strike a deal in which Ralls will reveal the exact location of the wreck of the Red Witch in exchange for a portion of the gold recovered from it. But when the salvage operation is to begin, it is discovered that the wreck is resting precariously on an underwater ledge, half on the ledge and half hanging over deeper water, making salvage extremely dangerous. Ralls is the only one willing to take the risk. He dives down to the wreck and manages to get a portion of the gold back up to the surface. But then the wreck begins to slide off the ledge. Falling debris traps Ralls inside the wreck, and he dies after the descending wreckage severs the hose supplying him with air.

Review: DeMille's answer to "Gone With the Wind," an epic called "Reap the Wild Wind," the Duke wanted to make a similar themed film but with more complex characters.
John Wayne made "Wake of the Red Witch," a terrific follow-up that remakes elements of the original film but creates completely new situations and characters, and explores the dark side of people.
Both films open with John Wayne as a 19th Century sea captain who's ship is scuttled for the rich cargo.
In both films John Wayne fights a big octopus and is involved in a love triangle with a beautiful woman and his boss.
The characters were somewhat one-dimensional (John Wayne the unquestionable good guy, Ray Milland the unquestionable rich playboy, Paulette Goddard the unquestionable flirt).
As the story unfolds we see a much more complex mystery involving the captain's rich nemesis who respects the captain as a hero and worthy opponent and has driven John Wayne to madness.
I would suggest you see Cecil B' DeMille's "Reap the Wild Wind" first as it is much less satisfying and might be disappointing compared to the complexity of "Wake of the Red Witch," though both films are terrific entertainment and showcase John Wayne at his non-western best.
Note:  In the film, The Red Witch (a sailing ship) is owned by a company called Batjac, a name the Duke would use as the name of his own film company..
I'd never really thought of it that way, but it is definitely true.The Duke is hardly the classically trained actor that Laurence Olivier is, but as I've remarked in other reviews his was one of the great faces for movie closeups.
And he is probably in his most romantic role as Captain Ralls of the Red Witch.Of course this film is most compared to Reap the Wild Wind where also for romantic reasons, John Wayne piled a ship on the reefs and later went after the salvage.
But though the other film is a big budget product from one of the premier studios, Wake of the Red Witch is a much better story.The story is seen through the eyes of Gig Young as Wayne's first mate.
Wayne sinks the Red Witch because his employer, the malevolent Luther Adler has taken the lovely Gail Russell from him, through the connivance of her father Henry Daniell.
He rescues young Fernando Alvarado from a giant claim, kills a giant octopus for native pearls and searches for gold bullion on the sunken Red Witch.
I did look him up and found that he wrote a number of seafaring adventures as well as Westerns.So, I thought the plot developed very nicely with the right amount of intrigue mixed in with some action, sea scenes, and romance.
We gradually discover the background of the animosity between John Wayne and his nemesis, played quite ably by Luther Adler.
I enjoyed John Wayne in most of the films he did outside his usual genres of Westerns and War flicks.
Besides the good acting and plot, "Wake of the Red Witch" had some good cinematography with sea and sailing shots, and very good underwater action.
Mythical uneven story with great acting of Wayne and Russell.
It is basically a Wuthering Heights of the Southern Seas, with a very young and slim Wayne being pulled into a story of intrigue and lost love by the most beautiful Gail Russell.
John Wayne plays a sea captain set adrift on the waters after a falling out with natives on an island in the East Indies; he's soon picked up by another ship but butts heads (in a gentlemanly fashion) with that captain, a well-respected shipping magnate, especially after they return to the native island and both men fall in love with a beautiful white girl.
Mostly told (rather unnecessarily) in flashback, there are two treasure dives--the first for pearls and then for gold--yet by the time we get around to the second pillage, all the wind has gone out of this movie's sails.
Gail Russell is indeed lovely as the woman who comes between the two ego-fed men, but her role turns the film from a sea-faring adventure story into a star-crossed, doomed-lovers romance, and the results are all wet.
The Duke is fun wrestling with an octopus, saving a native boy from the piercing clamp of a giant clam, or mouthing off to whomever is in charge; he's at his most robust and handsome here, but his performance doesn't bolster the wayward plotting and his final scene is a real let-down.
From one of the many novels written by Garland Roark comes this dramatic story which the Legendary John Wayne enhanced with his mere presence.
Directed by Edward Ludwig the story is masterfully written and tells the naval tale of an adventurous sea Captain named Ralls (John Wayne) who's a courageous soldier of fortune.
They include Gail Russell, Gig Young, Luther Adler, Henry Daniell, Paul Fix and Jeff Corey.
I enjoy most John Wayne films, notably his Westerns, and a long time ago read several books about him, but Wake of the Red Watch was all but unknown to me.
(British TV frequently screens his better-known films butI can't recall "Wake" being shown before.)It wasn't at all bad, if one overlooks some of the clichés and limited production values, and Wayne portrays a character more complex and less sympathetic than in any other of his films, even Red River and The Searchers.Some of the plot twists were a bit hard to follow, and I'm still not sure about the relationship between Ralls and Sidneye - it seemed to mellow towards the end.Before watching the film I hadn't bothered to note its date and, going on Wayne's youthful appearance and the unsophisticated aspects of filming and plotting, I guessed it was early 1940s.
Wake of The Red Witch is really one of the secrets of John Wayne's career.
The first thirty minutes or so of Wake Of The Red Witch has so many characters, and it's so hard to figure out what's happening, it may remind you of The Big Sleep.
Nevertheless, this is a very exotic (as in strangely but appealingly different) and entertaining movie and a different direction for John Wayne, who plays one of the most sinister and cruelest characters of his career.Republic Pictures was a studio with a reputation for making movies on the cheap without the final product looking cheap.
It has a terrific cast, headed by Wayne and Gail Russell, excellently supported by Gig Young, Adelle Mara, Luther Adler, Henry Daniel, Eduard Franz, Paul Fix, and Grant Withers.
This may point to some radical re-editing between the premiere and the general release three months later.Set in the 1860's Dutch East Indies and surrounding area, the story revolves around a bitter but respectful rivalry between sea captain Wayne and ship owner Adler.
Their rivalry eventually becomes the sole reason each has for living.Wayne was coming off the release of the highly successful Red River, which had actually been filmed two years earlier, when Wake Of The Red Witch was made.
There was a little of Tom Dunson, the cruel, tyrannical rancher he played in Red River in practically every movie John Wayne subsequently made.
There is a lot of Dunson in his Captain Ralls in Wake Of The Red Witch.
Wayne and Adler's intense character studies are what makes this movie really worth watching.
And Gig Young should have kept the mustache.Wake Of The Red Witch is one of John Wayne's best performances, an entertaining, action-packed, and mysterious picture..
One of John Wayne's more divisive and different films from the 1940s.
Speaking of which, this bears a few similarities to another Wayne film about love triangles and men at sea - Reap the Wild Wind..
Hired "Red Witch" skipper John Wayne (as Captain Ralls) vies with financier boss Luther Adler (as Mayrant Ruysdaal Sidneye) for not only the love of beautiful Gail Russell (as Angelique), but also five million dollars in gold bullion.
Their tale is told in "flashback" style, by fellow traveler Gig Young (as Sam Rosen).The story might be described as a "Heart of Darkness" attempt to adapt Wayne's "Reap the Wild Wind" into Laurence Olivier's "Wuthering Heights".
There is some ambitious underwater camera-work, which fails, due to, for example, an unremarkable editing in of Wayne close-ups.Everyone tries awfully hard to make "Wake of the Red Witch" hunt, but it doesn't.
**** Wake of the Red Witch (12/30/48) Edward Ludwig ~ John Wayne, Gail Russell, Luther Adler, Gig Young.
My all time favorite of all the John Wayne movies.
Apart from being one of John Wayne's more enigmatic roles 'The Red Witch' is treated to an insipid screenplay, direction, music, and effects.
An interesting cast is the best thing about it -with the always convincing Luther Adler taking the honours, Gig Young follows a close second, while Gail Russell looks pretty, she has a waterlogged character that hardly rises to the surface.
Some nice shots of ships at sea along with a couple of reasonable underwater set-ups help it through a generally silly plot that takes the wind out if its sails, leaving it sadly floundering.
DeMille actioner, "Reap the Wild Wind." Scenes from both of these films have been lifted whole from the originals and welded into the flimsy supporting latticework of its plot.
What weaknesses the film has, however, are more than made up by the vividness of the characterizations, a powerful romance, and one of the best portrayals of a grudging symbiotic relationship in cinema.The plot revolves around three characters, Ralls (John Wayne), ship's captain with a dark and dangerous side, Mayrant Sidneye (Luther Adler), an ubber-wealthy shipping magnate, and the beautiful Angelique (Gail Russell)--focal point for the romance.
(There is a fourth "main" character, Sam, played by Gig Young, but he serves only as observer and narrator.) Ralls and Sidneye have a curious, bitter rivalry.
So tied up in each other's fate are they that they would do just as well to kill themselves.**SPOILERS** The doomed romance plays out between the three principles much as it does in the aforementioned '39 film "Wuthering Heights," complete with a virtual duplication of the dying scene--in this case with Angelique in Ralls' arms, looking out to the sea (instead of the heather), with Sidneye, the husband, looking helplessly on.
That this is a virtual copy of the love story from the earlier film does not detract much from its power, as these three actors are at their riveting best, almost making us forget the Olivier/Oberon/Niven flimization.
Here she gives us one of her two best performances, the other being in "Angel and the Badman" from the year before which also starred John Wayne.
Though the main focus is on the two male characters, her luminous, fragile Angelique gives the viewer a sympathetic refuge from the often ruthless machinations of Ralls and Sidneye.Undeniably, John Wayne gives one of his best--and most complex-- performances here.
Wake of the Red Witch may be John Wayne in his most demanding role.
He plays Captain Rawles who skuttles the Red Witch to later go back and rescue it's treasure in gold bullion.
Wayne has never has so many colorful character elements in any film.
The main advantage here is that Gail Russell is more vulnerable and beautiful than Merle Oberon was in "Heights" And the last scene with John and Gail at the wheel of the ghost ship, Red Witch is a never to be forgotten Hollywood film moment.Haunting!.
If ever a movie deserved the expression, "they don't make 'em like this anymore", it is "Wake of the Red Witch".
Set in the South Seas during the mid-Nineteenth Century it stars John Wayne as Captain Ralls, a tough ship's master, and a man embittered by unhappy memories.
Ralls has fallen in love with the same woman as Mayrant Sydneye, a powerful trader played by Luther Adler, setting in motion a rivalry that is mutually destructive.
The special effects crew must have buckled at the knees when informed that the script called for a battle with a giant octopus over a chest full of pearls, a native diver trapped by a giant clam, a couple of shipwrecks and finally, a sunken ship sliding off a rock shelf into the depths below.When John Wayne wrestles the octopus, he doesn't actually wrap the tentacles around himself like Bela Lugosi did in Ed Wood's "Bride of the Monster", but it's close.
From the driven and ruthless Ralls in the earlier scenes, he becomes the tough, but warm-hearted character familiar to anyone who has seen films such as Rio Bravo or Sons Of Katie Elder – all that was needed to completely dispel the mood would have been for him to don a cowboy hat.That "Wake Of The Red Witch" works at all is due to its outlandish, larger-than-life story, Wayne's personal magnetism, and to very good work by the supporting cast.
She provides the perfect foil to Wayne's testosterone charged Ralls, making believable his transformation into the gentle, sensitive lover he becomes in her company."Wake Of The Red Witch" is so over-the-top it almost defies criticism.
Later in his career, John Wayne would bring a certain amount of self-parody to his roles but in "Wake of the Red Witch" he plays it straight.
John Wayne is Master of the Red Witch in 1860 and, with the complicity of his first mate, Gig Young, runs her aground and sinks her along with her cargo of millions of dollars in gold.
And millions of dollars of gold that belong to Adler sit in the belly of the sunken Red Witch, whose location is known only to Wayne.Wayne's performance is about at par.
(He was hesitant about admitting that he had lung cancer because the public Duke should not be laid low by a disease.) He seemed not to recognize it when he showed his considerable talent in character roles in "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon," for instance, or "True Grit." After "The Wake of the Red Witch," I don't think he ever allowed his screen character to approach villainy so closely.In any case, this may be Luther Adler's film.
"The Wake of the Red Witch" is a curious film in that it stars John Wayne as a villain, or at least as something closer to a villain than to the sort of clean-cut characters Wayne usually played, or even to his flawed heroes in films like "The Searchers" and "The Shootist".
Wayne's character Captain Ralls is a ship's captain in the Dutch East Indies during the 1860s.
It is already clear that the two men are enemies of long standing, and the two flashbacks, taken together, explain the reason for their enmity, why Ralls sank the Red Witch and why Sidneye dropped the proceedings against him.
The full story is too complicated to set out here, but it revolves around their rivalry for the love of the same woman, Angelique.The highly melodramatic plot, in fact, gets a bit too convoluted at times and can be difficult to follow.
Gail Russell, who had also starred with Wayne the previous year in "Angel and the Badman", is a bit insipid as the lovely Angelique.
(This scene may have inspired a similar scene in another seafaring yarn from a few years later, "Pearl of the South Seas", which features an even more ludicrously unconvincing giant octopus).On the other hand, Luther Adler is good as the greedy and obsessive shipping magnate Sidneye, and Ludwig's unusual narrative style does enough to hold our interest.
In 1949 our family saw it twice, two nights in a row, at our neighborhood theater; the only such movie.A mean and brooding John Wayne sails the South Seas in search of riches and power, and will find Gail Russell in the process.
The big problem is the ship has landed precariously on an underwater ledge, not on a flat sea-bottom.Three years later, Republic starred John Wayne in "The Quiet Man." No doubt their all time best movie.
But for 3 years, Red Witch was their very best.
The plot is more or less Wuthering Heights with seaweed and in the Heathcliff role Duke Wayne acquits himself reasonably well whilst Gail Russell trades heavily on her fragile beauty and lacks the spine of a Cathy Earnshaw.
Unfortunately, my long wait was not rewarded and instead I saw one of John Wayne's worst films of the 1940s.
Second, Wayne's part was also terribly uneven and his character seemed, at times, like a jerk--and once again, a lot like the guy he played in REAP THE WILD WIND.
Wake of the Red Witch (1948) is a pretty poor romantic drama and its plot is virtually the same as the Gothic novel, "Wuthering Heights" or at least the famous 1939 adaptation of it.
John Wayne is looking for riches surrounded by natives, Gail Russell, Luther Adler and a very young Gig Young.The picture should have been in color for starters.
Wouldn't you really like to see The "Red" Witch of a boat?The story is one of revenge between Luther Adler, a vicious, cunning individual who stole Gale Russell from the clutches of Wayne.To get revenge, Wayne sunk Adler's Red Witch boat and Adler shall reciprocate as the film goes on.Miss Russell must have thought that she was Merle Oberon in the way that she attempted to play her death scene similar to Oberon's "Wuthering Heights." The uneven writing doesn't help one bit.Wayne joining Miss Russell in death at the end while searching for gold at the bottom of the sea is Hollywood mush.This film needs to be waked..
. of its 2001 Artisan "John Wayne Collection" DVD release could not even keep the main facts straight themselves on their WAKE OF THE RED WITCH jewel case.
John Wayne fans may wish to skip this picture, as the Duke's character "Capt.
WAKE OF THE RED WITCH is an unusual outing for John Wayne and a far cry from the typical western pictures that he's best known for.