A Ilha do Tesouro

Victor Flemming, famous helmer for bigger films such as Gone With The Wind, conducts this adventure story with a pleasant, confidant ease, if not a touch of true inspiration.

Wallace Beery is brilliant as Long John Silver while Jackie Cooper as Jim plays the perfect sounding board to Beery's loud, large, charismatic performance.

Faithful to Mr. Louis Stevenson's chirography of the same tile; in this writer's humble opinion this incarnation of the film captures, most closely, the tone of the original novel - maybe it being closest to the novel chronologically can account for that.

Beery delivers a truly classic American performance here, that anyone, even the most media jaded of our day, should have fun following the old tar and his young friend in their adventures across this terraqueous globe.

It is easy to spot great acting in this movie. Wallace Beary is great cast as Long John Silver. Jackie Cooper gives another fine child performance. As a matter of fact, the entire cast does very well.

What might be over looked often is that part of the reason this is so so good is that it is well based on the Robert Lewis Stevenson novel. The rest goes to the most often overlooked Direction of Victor Fleming.

Fleming proves in this early film that his work in the films Wizard of Oz & Gone With The Wind is no accident (some critics have called him an erratic Director for hire). He does a great job directing this cast & this story. Some of the sequences show how good a director Fleming really is.

After seeing this film recently, I am now convinced that Victor is a much better director than his detractors give him credit for. While this film does not have all the whiz bang special effects that newer pirate films have created, the great acting & directing more than makes up for that.

Add to that the amazing fact that this film brings in so much good stuff that it only needs 101 minutes to cover a major novel is enough to make you wonder if some of the new longer films about pirates just aren't very efficient in telling their tales.

Hollywood vintage adaptation of the Robert Louis Stevenson pirate adventure from an eyeball-rolling Wallace Beery and a splendid Jacke Coogan . Again we live the roaring adventure of men against the sea . We share the struggles, the heartaches, the laughter of courageous souls who leave their houses they love to dare the wrath of the angry pirates. Upright men and greedy pirates in conflict with their destiny enacting the Robert Stevenson's most thrilling story. Jim Hawkins (an appealing acting by Jackie Coogan) encounters the map that lead to a distant island where is a buried treasure. Then , the young boy join forces with captain Smollett (Lewis Stone), Squire (Nigel Bruce), Doctor Livesey (Otto Kruger) and of course a boisterous Long John Silver(a brilliant triumph by Wallace Beery who is notably snarly , though relatively subdued) journey to isle of hidden bounty. The young cabin boy Hawkins has a treasure map and a boatload of kill-crazed pirates eager for the riches hidden on Treasure Island . Jim Hawkins matches with peg-legged Long Silver and adventures go on .

Fun story of high seas adventure plenty of intrigue , fights and action. The whole piece of adventure teems with emotion , thrills , humor , atmosphere and being pretty amusing . Appropriately adventurous rendition of Robert Stevenson's often-filmed and spine-tingling tale , in which Wallace Beery hands perfectly the role as rogue pirate and gives a memorable acting, as always. Jackie Coogans as sympathetic naive Jim is fabulous and appealing . Delightful performance by Charles Chic Sale as Ben Gunn, as well. At the film appears usual and notorious secondary actors in several Hollywood productions, such as Lionel Barrymore as Billy Bones , Otto Kruger as Doctor Livesey , Lewis Stone as Captain Smollett , Douglass Dumbrille as Pirate of the Spanish Main and Watson's Nigel Bruce as Squire . The motion picture was well directed directed by Victor Fleming . This production is powered by the great Wallace Beery and likable Jackie Coogan. Also available in horrible colorized version . Rating : Above average . Well worth watching , you'll be on the edge of your seat .

Other renditions -being multitudinous remakes , as there are many films made of it- based on this classic novel are the followings : Disney take on (1950) by Byron Haskin with Robert Newton , Basil Sydney and Bobby Driscoll , respectable full-blooded second-best the classic Fleming version ; European retelling (1974) by John Hough with Orson Welles , Angel Del Pozo , Lionel Stander and Kim Burfield ; Teasure Island (1999) by Marc Charlesbois with Jack Palance , Patrick Bergin and Kevin Zegers ; TV recounting by Fraser C Heston with Charlton Heston , Christian Bale and Richard Johnson ; and cartoon-Sci-Fi version Treasure planet (2002) directed by John Musker and Ron Clemens . Furthermore , Muppet's Treasure island and recent rendition (2012) starred by Eddie Izzard .

... based on Robert Louis Stevenson's book, from MGM and director Victor Fleming. Jackie Cooper stars as Jim Hawkins, a boy working in his mother's seaside inn. One night a crusty old sea dog named Billy Bones (Lionel Barrymore) arrives with a large chest which he zealously guards. When circumstances lead to it being opened, a treasure map is inside, which inspires Squire Trelawney (Nigel Bruce) to sponsor a sea voyage to look for the hidden booty. Jim goes along for the journey, and befriends a one-legged sea veteran named Long John Silver (Wallace Beery) who may turn out to be more than just a ship's cook.

I read Stevenson's book as a kid, but I never watched any of the many film adaptations until fairly recently, when I watched the 1990 TV movie version starring a young Christian Bale as Jim and Charlton Heston as Long John Silver. This MGM version manages to do more in less time, and I liked Beery in the Silver role much more than Heston. Cooper, on the other hand, gives an awful "movie-kid" performance that pulled me out of the story with almost every line he uttered. I tend to be overly harsh on kids in movies (I'm not a fan), so letting that slide, this is an enjoyable adventure tale with excellent costumes and settings. This was a big hit for MGM, and helped spur a boom in nautical films and other period adventure movies, such as the following year's Captain Blood and Mutiny on the Bounty.

I noticed, like some of the other reviewers, that few in the film had the necessary British accents needed to play these characters well. However, despite this, the movie is an excellent version of the Stevenson novel--mostly due to good acting, great sets and the nice MGM polish you'd expect from one of their top productions.

As far as the film goes, it's one of the earliest of the Wallace Beery films that teamed him with a cute kid--a formula that was repeated again and again up until Beery's death in 1949. Considering that according to his co-star, Jackie Cooper, Beery hated children and did little to hide it off camera--so I am sure in some ways Beery probably wished this and "The Champ" hadn't been so successful!!

As for the story, it's the often told story of "Treasure Island" by Robert Louis Stevenson. It's reasonably faithful to the story and is better than other versions I have seen. However, I have NOT seen the very famous Robert Newton version (by many seen as the best), so I cannot say the 1934 version was the best--though many of the newer versions tended to be a bit more dull. Like it or not, the Beery-Cooper schmaltz was entertaining--and I can see why audiences fell for it by the millions!

By the way, like so many releases from Turner Entertainment, this film includes many wonderful extras from the same studio (MGM) from the same year as this feature's release. Turner also does this with many of their classic Warner Brothers releases as well--making them excellent values for customers.