Saturday Island

This is a sort of Admirable Crichton but with the lack of any of its class.The acting of Tab Hunter is substandard.Donald Gray is as stiff as a board.Darrell is pretty but is obviously on her way down in the pecking order.One of the many contract actors left adrift by the end of her studio contract.The story,which has been recounted by other reviewers,is so silly it is unintentionally funny.The arrival of Donald Gray on the hour mark sets the film on a downward course from which it never recovers

BBC radio actor Donald Gray was selected to play one of the leads as a Pilot Officer and the story was manipulated around the actor only having one arm having lost it in combat in the War. The story concerned Linda Darnell playing a Canadian Nurse to Tab Hunter playing a US Marine who are stranded during wartime on a Desert Island. A romance develops between the two until Gray is shot down over the Island and Darnell uses her nursing skills to save him. A triangle developes there is a film fight described by Director Henry Hathaway " he intended to make cinema history by staging the toughest and most earthy battle between two love struck beasts for a woman that had ever been filmed.

Hunter and Gray took all day to rehearse clout by clout and fall by fall. It came out very hammy with both actors bruised. It was most unlikely a 19 year old ex Life Guard losing to a 37 year old Gray supposedly recently having had his arm amputated. In the end Darnell chooses Gray but only thing about film described as any good was Darnell appearing sultry dressed in rags revealing more flesh than the censor would then have considered decent. The filming set in Jamaica won prizes and Gray's acting was praised. Otherwise it was a flop but did raise money for limbless ex servicemans association. Gray commented that cast were in a 5 star hotel with all expenses paid with warm twilights soft calypso music and the unbelievable beauty of caribbean beaches. Palms waved, frogs whistled and dressing for dinner in a white tuxedo. Gray was rather sad when weather broke and film completed in Elstree Studios. Gray went on to become a Newsreader and then Mark Saber whereas Darnell and Hunter made a name for themselves in Westerns. Unfortunately film shot in technicolour is now sadly not available on video but though dire outdoor locations were breathtaking.

I first saw this movie when it came out in 1952 and for years have looked for it for my collection. It is sad that Hollywood has not tried to save this film and others like it. Tab Hunter was exciting to young women at that time because he was young and had a great body. Ms. Darnell was a sexy nurse that Tab (a young U. S. Marine) saves after their ship is torpedoed by the Japanese. They make it to a lush tropical island where a budding romance begins. The scenes are beautiful and so are the suggestive scenes of their attraction for each other. Their romance is interrupted when Mr. Laurie crashes his plane in the water off their island and is rescued by Tab. Darnell and Laurie are closer in age and their love grows. I loved this movie and hope that someday technology will allow the distribution on DVD this film.

Ridiculous story about a never consummated romance between astonishingly handsome blond teen marine and awesomely gorgeous older woman stranded on a desert island...only to be all heartbroken when she prefers the stodgy pencilmoustached one armed older Pilot who drops from the sky..... this technicolour tease should almost be the BLUE LAGOON of 1952. The idea that she just did not have this peachy hunk's loincloth ripped away within their first half hour alone together defies credibility. There are scenes as revealing as Christopher Atkins romping about in 1980, and incredulously, they remain physically apart for the duration of this hammy but spunky film. Tab Hunter is blindingly handsome and Linda Darnell is every bit as lustworthy as Jane Russell. Astonishingly, in or out of the cheesecloth nappy he half wears, and through her designer rags, somehow they forget to just spend 24-7 licking each other senseless. Visually it is all swoon-worthy but every ten minutes the viewer erupts from a staring stupor to screech "Oh! Come on!" at the screen.

I remembered this films ads. I must have been 10 or 12. It was Linda Darnell & Tab Hunter (a new Hollywood discovery) standing near naked on an island. Well I wanted to see it. I didn't. Years later I finally acquired a VCR tape. It was enjoyable. Great acting. Hardly. The script was all but ridiculous, and no actor could make it into a Shakespearean TEMPEST. They don't try.It does look as tho the actors were having a good time though. This was the movie that made Tab Hunter a star. Linda Darnel was a beauty. And for 1952, this was a hot rendition of look but barely touch. Wonder what the Legion of Decency thought of this film back then?