Sa majesté des mouches

After a plane crash in the ocean, a group of British students reach an island. The boy Ralph (James Aubrey) organizes the other kids, assigning responsibilities for each one. When the rebel Jack (Tom Chapin) neglects the fire camp and they lose the chance to be seen by an airplane, the group split under the leadership of Jack. While Ralph rationalizes the survival procedures, Jack returns to the primitivism, using the fear for the unknown (in a metaphor to the religion) and hunger to control the other boys. His group starts hunting and chasing pigs, stealing the possession of Ralph's group and even killing people.

When I saw the 1990 "The Lord of the Flies", I found the impressive story very scary since it shows the lost of innocence of children fighting to survive in a society without perspective and rules. My immediate association was with my and other Third World countries, where many children are abandoned by the Government in their poor communities, and without education, perspectives in life and laws, become very young criminals working in gangs of drug dealers and thieves. In this movie, it is exposed how primitive a kid can be without the authority and respect, and this sort of violence is in the headlines of our newspapers almost every day. I have never the chance of reading this visionary novel, but both movies are very similar and I believe that they are good adaptations, with a frightening study of characters and sociology. My vote is eight.

Title (Brazil): "O Senhor das Moscas" ("The Lord of the Flies")

After reading Golding's classic novel, my class watched this adaption of "Lord Of The Flies" in our literature class. I found it to be quite good, and a hell of a lot better than the 1990 version, which alters all too many important moments and characteristics of the book. Reading over these comments, I was very confused. 1. The story and moral of "Lord Of The Flies" is so haunting and powerful that it does not need an overly dramatic score. The tune that Jack and his choir sing around the island is just the right touch. 2. Of course the acting wasn't as amazing as it could have been! Everyone seems to be forgetting just how young and inexperienced these boys were. Besides, the character's in Golding's story are just as young, and act their age (however violent and disturbing it may be). I found the camera work to be quite lovely. The film uses beautiful shots, which only enhance it even more. The final scene is one of my favorites. My only bone to pick is how quickly the film goes through the events in the book. I really do wish it would have slowed down a bit, and concentrated more on such characters as Simon, as well as the boys transformation into savages. Overall I found this adaption of "Lord Of The Flies" to be fantastic. My advice to future viewers of this film is to read the book first, definitely watch this 1963 version afterwards,and completely avoid the 1990 version all together.

May I start by saying a pox on those who do not love the cast.

I honestly can't see why you complain. I love the book; I didn't need to read it for school, but I read it anyway and enjoyed it. I understood the message Golding brought about. Then why am I not offended by this movie as I was by Lord of the Rings?

This film is an excellent translation of Golding's novel. It is stark, bold and well directed. The young cast are frighteningly talented, especially Chapin and Edwards. This has everything I expected and much more. Perhaps I was wishing for a more vivid "Lord of the Flies" scene, but it brought it's message across and kept everything in the book alive. I marvel every time I see Edwards' Piggy. I can't understand the capacity the boy had at such an age. Jack was well portrayed also, as was Ralph.

The ending was perfect. I admit the music did throw me off a tad but everything else just came so willingly. The emotions of the boys practically leaked out through to me, and that one little boy in particular (I've forgotten his name, I'm afraid - is it Percy?) looking up at the sea-captain just personified everything that the ending symbolised. This film is one of my favourites and I cannot see how anyone could fault it so drastically.

".......May I start by saying a pox on those who do not love the cast....The young cast are frighteningly talented" Thank You! Yes, the cast was talented in a non-professional way and that is perhaps what made the film work. But the real story of how the film was made is this: Off set was very much like on set. We lived in an abandoned pineapple warehouse and all called each other by our movie names. There was a split in the cast - sort of one "gang" against another - although in the real life one Jack and Ralph were on the same side (the leader of the other gang being one of the other choir boys). The gangs would make "war" on each other with Jack and Ralph's bunch headquartered out in the cane fields while the other bunch had a metal scaffold "fort" near the warehouse. In the beginning the cast was more of less evenly split but in the end I found I was on the "losing" side since we were down to only two people! So, filming was not all that difficult for the kids and much of it was simply letting us go at it. For instance the hut building scene was turned into a contest of who could build the best hut with a watermelon being the prize. That the cameras were going was only a secondary concern for the kids. Anyways, it was fun and make for some great childhood memories. Kent Fletcher (Percival), Corvallis OR USA

I read the book when I was a kid, and I found it to be very disturbing. I didn't really care to think why.

Watching this movie as a grown up (especially as a grown up trying to think about anything BUT work) made me ponder several things about human behavior. For instance, what makes one person lead and another follow? Why is there almost always just 2 prominent sides to a situation, even though there are people involved whose opinions may be of varying shades of gray? Isn't it strange that once you commit an act of taboo, that it just makes it so much easier to do the next time? Why is an act that is morally reprehensible to perform individually, become so much easier when it is done in group? Where does one's individualism go when "mob rule" prevails ? I think the movie did a good job of bringing out the "beast", but it didn't surpass my initial impression from reading the book. The acting was commendable, given the age and experience of the actors, and the classic novel they were trying to portray. Ralph was just superb, trying to lead with "reason", but watching his leadership ebb to a much more terrifying alter ego. The relentlessness and inevitability of his fate was captured in all its horror when he is told "They're going to hurt you, Ralph".

Its hard to write a review about just the movie, when the story itself (as told in the book) is what makes the biggest impression. The movie is rich in metaphors - innocence lost, war, society in general, right and wrong, etc. In closing, I would recommend this movie to anyone looking for fear, but not of the sensational variety that 'horror movies' are generally associated with. Its a black and white movie, made in the 60's, and stars a bunch of scrawny kids. The fear is what you have to not watch - but live.