Camera Three: Moby-Dick (Part 5)

This was the era before high def. Frankly, in 1954, they hardly had any def whatsoever. Consequently, it is difficult to appreciate early television as it was experienced by the original audience (whose TV’s were small black-and-white screens on enormous consoles). However, the classy minimalist aesthetic of Robert Herridge’s Camera Three anthology series still holds up. Long considered lost, the fifth concluding installment of Camera Three’s Moby-Dick, directed by Frank Moriarty, screens as part of Anthology Film Archive’s Herridge program this Sunday.

As viewers ought to know, nearly the entire crew of the Pequod is doomed. They all realize it too by the start of the fifth episode. Starbuck just missed his chance to essentially “frag” Captain Ahab, whose obsession with the white whale will obviously end in disaster. Starbuck still tries to persuade Ahab to return to Nantucket, but the die is cast.

Moriarty and Herridge (the producer and screenwriter) never resort to plastic whales or drenching the cast with buckets of water. This is a Spartan set, consisting of little more than masts. The small ensemble relates most of the action in monologues, faithfully distilled (by Herridge) from Melville’s text. Yet, the stark use of light and shadow, as well as the cast’s powerful deliveries remain eerily powerful.

One of the saddest aspects of Camera Three’s adaptation of Moby-Dick is the hauntingly good performance of Gerald Sarracini as Starbuck.  At the time, he was an emerging star on TV and Broadway, but a street fight cut his life tragically short. Had he lived, he might have been considered in the company of John Cassavetes and Ben Gazzara.

It is also quite a revelation to watch Earle Hyman, who is truly magnetic as Ismail. While Hyman did indeed enjoy a long career, he is unfortunately best known for playing Cliff Huxtable’s father on The Cosby Show (which has fallen out of favor, for reasons beyond his control), while his early prestigious work on Moby-Dick remains largely missing and/or unavailable.

Furthermore, Peter Mark Richman (who was a staple on 1950s-1970s TV, including The Twilight Zone) might contribute one of the best portrayals of Stubb, of any adaptation. Of course, the Ahab makes or breaks every Moby-Dick, but the now little-known A. Winfield Hoeny (who recorded several spoken-word 78s) completely looks and sounds the part.

Fortunately (since this is all we have), the fifth installment of Moby-Dick stands on its own quite well, but it is shame the entire adaptation remains essentially lost. It still represents some terrific television, featuring a number of recognizable character actors, at their finest. Very highly recommended (and not just as a novelty), Moby-Dick Part 5 screens this Sunday (5/11) at Anthology Film Archives.

Moby-Dick as Quest Fantasy: The Age of the Dragons

In her novel Ahab’s Wife, Sena Jeter Naslund tells the story of the sailor’s wife only briefly mentioned in Melville’s Moby-Dick. An intrepid band of filmmakers did her one better, introducing viewers to Rachel, Ahab’s adopted daughter-crew member, whom Melville must have surely implied, but just never got around to writing about in his great American novel. They added dragons too. Yes, Moby-Dick is reset in an epic fantasy universe. A real curiosity piece, Ryan Little’s The Age of the Dragons (trailer here) is now available from Go Digital Media Group on platforms like itunes and pay-per-view youtube.

In this world, dragons are hunted for their vitriol, a highly combustible and expensive form of fuel. Of course, Ahab is not in it for the money. He wants revenge from a great white dragon—just like the book, except not really. Ishmael, should you chose to call him that, is a dragon harpooner looking too sign onto the crew of the feared dragon hunter. He and his moody sidekick Queequeg are hired by Ahab’s adopted daughter, Rachel (presumably a nod to one of the other ships mentioned in the Melville novel). Of course, she is attractive, generating all kinds of helpful sexual tension within the crew. This most definitely includes Ishmael, but she does not seem to mind his attentions as much.

Age would probably have worked better if they had been hunting sea-dragons, because that would have given them an excuse to serve aboard a ship. Instead, the Pequod is an anachronistic armored wagon that could have been a castoff from the Jawas. Shockingly though, the dragon effects are not all that bad, but brother, Danny Glover sure is. Perhaps Ahab’s make-up is partly to blame, making Glover look as if he were simply drizzled with candle wax. However, he is so overwrought and pointlessly venomous, he single-handedly reduces the film to low camp.

As the romantic leads (in Moby-Dick?) Corey Sevier and Sofia Pernas are a bit stiff perhaps, but not to a debilitating extent. Frankly, ex-footballer turned genre movie heavy Vinnie Jones steals the show as second mate Stubb, exhibiting charisma and energy well beyond viewer expectations. Unfortunately, the film inexplicably kills off their trump card before it even reaches the third act. Still, David Morgan also adds some nice supporting seasoning as the morally ambiguous first mate Starbuck.

Age actually had a theatrical release in the UK (where it was critically pummeled), but here in America it suffered the indignity of airing as a Syfy original movie. Granted, Melville given the fantasy once-over is definitely gimmicky filmmaking in the Corman tradition, but some credible work went into it. To their credit, Little’s effects team did not skimp on the dragons. There are scads of them and they look decent by outside-of-Hollywood standards, particularly when seen flying in the distance. However, the screenplay’s contrivances make it devilishly difficult to buy into the lunacy. Still, it is hard to resist checking out such a wacky high concept. So now you know this exists. It can be found on itunes.