Director Peter Brook's faithful adaptation of William Golding's 1954 novel stars James Aubrey and Tom Chapin as antagonists Ralph and Jack, respectively. When a plane carrying 30-odd British schoolboys out of a war zone crashes on an island, all the adults are killed. The boys organize for survival, naming Ralph as their chief, in charge of providing fire and shelter. Jack is designated to lead a group of boys to hunt the wild pigs that roam the island. Almost inevitably, as time passes, the two boys, representatives of civilization and savagery, begin a deadly struggle for dominance. The frequently invoked image of life as a "war of all against all," in which civility is merely another weapon in the battle to gain one's ends, is given a particularly disturbing twist because it is enacted by children. Brooks shot an enormous amount of footage, a documentary style ratio of 60:1, and used nonprofessional actors to achieve a raw, visceral realism. With a jauntily ironic score by Raymond Leppard, the film succeeds completely in suggesting the chilling malignity that can lurk beneath a bland exterior.
Theatrical Release: August 13, 1963.
One of the first films to be shot using a hand-held camera and zoom telephoto camera lens.
The film was shot on Vieques, an island off the coast of Puerto Rico that was used by the U.S. Navy as a controversial training facility for over 60 years.
In 1996, BBC director Richard Dale produced a 50-minute reunion documentary called TIME FLIES, in which the now-adult cast members revisited the island 35 years after filming.
DVD Features:
Keep Case
Full Frame 1.33
Audio:
Dolby Digital 1.0 - English
Distributor Notes: Under the direction of Peter Brook, William Golding's classic fable, about a swarm of young boys who devolve into chaos without adult supervision after crash-landing on a remote island during wartime, becomes an unforgettable work of cinematic horror. Shot with almost verite camera work, Lord of the Flies takes a radical approach to Brook's metaphor, grounding it in a terrifying reality.
Source: Image Entertainment Inc.
Associate Producer
Gerald Feil: Cinematographer
Director of Photography
Tom Hollyman: Cinematographer
Review 1:
"...Brook's vérité approach allows the full force of Golding's allegory to assert itself..."
Source: Sight and Sound
p.64 12/01/2002
Review 2:
4 stars out of 5 -- "[R]endered oddly, devastatingly convincing here....This looks starker, stranger and better than ever."
Source: Uncut
p.123 09/01/2007
Review 3:
5 stars out of 5 -- "Superb....A role model for successful novel adaptations."
Source: Ultimate DVD
p.124 08/01/2007
Review 4:
"[T]he film had a roughness and authenticity that a polished Hollywood version would surely have lacked."
Source: Sight and Sound
p.94 03/01/2008
Shopping Cart:
