L'aventure est au large

During the 1960s, a Caribbean sailor and his likeable daughter search for a buried treasure throughout the perilous Caribbean sea, being full of unsavory pirates. A tolerable agreeable juvenile adventure romp which cast a beautiful teen, Hayley Mills, as a tomboy daughter of a rogue sea drifter performed by her actual daddy John Mills. Along the way Hayley Mills falls for a cute young advocate at law, James MacArthur. Here hurricane Hayley whirling her way through a tropical romantic adventure. Kiss her and she will make your head swim... If she does not knock of you block..Hayley a tomboy.. With delicious curves..

Freely based on a novel titled : Satan , a romance of the Bahamas, written by Henry Vere and enjoyable script by James L Barret . Well paced in Walt Disney style and competently starred by the sympathetic Hayley Mills as the obstinate daughter , John Mills as the roguish old sea dog and James MacArthur who is after romance with Hayley. All stars providing fine interpretations while working holiday in the Spanish sun. The film boasts such English stalwarts as Lionel Jeffries, Harry Andrews, Nial MacGinnis, all of them pretending to be peculiar pirates and have a high old time rolling their eyes. Most actors have all been in Walt Disney movies, including Hayley Mills, John Mills, David Tomlinson. In fact, Hayley Mills and John Mills performed 7 films together : So well remembered, Tiger bay, The parent trap, The chalk garden, The family way, The truth about Spring and a Tv episode of Love Boat. Furthermore, John Mills and James MacArthur starred as daddy and child in Swiss Family Robinson 1960 by Ken Annakin and produced by Walt Disney. In spite of being set in the Caribbean, this picture was actually shot off the coast of Spain, Brava Coast, Girona.

It displays a colorful and sunny cinematography by Edward Scaife, filmed on location in Costa Brava, Mediterranean coast, Spain . And adequate, evocative production design by Gil Parrondo, Oscar winner for Patton and Nicholas and Alexandra. As well as a rousing and thrilling musical score by Robert Farnon. This motion picture, The truth about Spring, was professionally directed by Richard Thorpe. The Hollywood veteran director Thorpe made all kinds of genres such as, Tarzan adventure : Tarzan finds a son, Tarzan escapes, Tarzan secret creature, Tarzan in NY. Musical : Athena, The student prince . Romantic comedy : On an island with you, Thrill of a romance, A date with July, Horizon lieutenant. Elvis Presley Movies :Fun in Acapulco, Jailhouse rock . Western : Vengeance valley. Adventures : Challenge to Lassie, The prodigal, All the brothers were valiant, Ivanhoe, Prisoner of Zenda, Malaya, Knights of the Round Table. Noir and intrigue : Above suspicion, Black hand, The tin man goes home. Rating 6/10. Nice film for the whole family.

Small-budget Universal film stars John Mills as the salty skipper of his own ramshackle fishing vessel whose teenage daughter finds romance for the first time with a law-school graduate on vacation; all three coast into trouble when modern-day pirates vie for a treasure map Mills has in his possession. Sub-Disney nonsense is brash and frantic, yet the high adventure we anticipate never quite arrives. Hayley Mills as Spring isn't allowed to act her age--she's too old to still be playing the kissless teenager--however her quieter moments with James MacArthur are sweetly done, and the film is certainly airy and lively, if not especially memorable. ** from ****

I, like most others in this forum, happen to love this little movie. There's something about its good-naturedness that is captivating, and its open-air-and-sea setting that gives it a timeless quality. The idea of being a capable young woman who travels around the Caribbean on a boat with a genial parent, leading an unstructured life with plenty of little adventures, must be quite attractive to young female viewers. And then there is Hayley Mills, the effortlessly charming English actress who forever inspires crushes. And why? Perhaps because she's pretty but not too pretty, English but not too English, quite lively but not brassy, and quite natural without the child actor show-offiness or affectations. Truly the girl you want to have next door. For fans of Hayley (note "HAYLEY": for some reason many in this forum can't spell her name correctly) this film has an air of poignancy about it because this is the last of her teen parts. After this she moved on to young adult parts ('That Darn Cat,' her next film, dolled her up and gave her a boyfriend right from the start --- and it was also her last Disney film). Here she'd just turned eighteen and co-star James MacArthur (son of Helen Hayes and famed screen & stage writer Charles MacArthur) was about 27. There had been a contest held by Hayley fans at the time as to who should co-star with her in this film and MacArthur (a Disney alumni) was given the top vote. He was married at the time so no off-screen romance developed. But they are cute together. In my opinion the scene where a trapped Hayley is teased with a rope that MacArthur drops down to her is a small showcase of Hayley's natural and economic comic timing: a kind of ability that Disney could never find again. And one of the pluses of this film is that it is NOT a Disney production, meaning that it has more of a laconic, low-key English flavor to it. It certainly could be mistaken for Disney, and might have made a bigger splash at the box office (it was a dud) and be easily available today on DVD or VHS if it had been, but as a trade-off, it has an easygoing charm without the Disney tendency to offer explosive, slapsticky finishes, or cartoony musical flourishes (e.g. 'In Search of the Castaways' or 'That Darn Cat'). There's also the pleasure of watching outstanding English character actors like Lionel Jeffries and Harry Andrews clearly enjoying themselves. And there's the obvious pleasure of watching the real father-daughter team of John and Hayley playing off each other. John Mills recounted how enjoyable it was making this movie because it was like one long holiday. And note that although the film's story takes place in the Caribbean, in fact, the movie itself was filmed along the southern coast of Spain. In addition, it was released in the UK as 'The Pirates of Spring Cove' and is available on video from England under that title (unfortunately, England uses the PAL video format, thus you have to have a video player that can play that format to view it). I agree that Universal Home Video has foolishly let this movie slip through the cracks, but sometimes movies have copyright problems, so it's possible that Universal would like to release this film but some rights issue is snagging things. Certainly this is not a lost masterpiece worthy of mass petitions or Congressional action, but I think it should be brought to Universal's attention that there ARE buyers out there waiting for a chance to own this little gem.

I saw this on tv many times while growing up in the 70s. Strange it has never been released on home video of any kind and even stranger it doesn't show up on tv or cable or satellite much these days. The film stars father and daughter John and Haley Mills about a crusty old 'sea captain' with a teen daughter whose plum for leaving the nest. The girl has grown up basically as a Tomboy crew cut and all, plying the sea lanes in and around the Florida Keys and living a sea-going nomads life with her father, but is now physically looking more like a woman. She's rounding out and is about 17 or 18 years old, Mills's true age in 1964. A young man called Ashton(played by James MacArthur) comes into their lives and he is taken with and falls in love with Spring(Haley's character). As all birds do young Spring must leave the nest which means Spring and Tommy(John Mills) have to separate. This is touching as the only life this girl has known has been living on one derelict boat after another in and out of the Florida Keys. After pondering her decisions, Spring decides to accept Ashton's marriage proposal and Tommy gives his blessing as he approves of Ashton.

The movie is well photographed with bright rich easy colors and could almost pass off as any of the Disney movies Haley Mills is best remembered for. Very family friendly even though modern day pirate action is supposed to denote a touch of menace to the picture. Tommy and his cohorts are much too lovable for any 'Yo Ho Ho'. A cast of well-known British character actors add to the fun of this 'pseudo' pirate adventure ie: Harry Andrews, Niall MacGinnis, Lionel Jeffries as Tommy's cronies. This is a fun-for-all tale of a girl coming of age and for me it reminds of the tv show Flipper. It takes place in the same area that Flipper does(Florida Keys vicinity) and was released around the same time Flipper premiered on t.v. in the mid-60s. Yep a good fable about coming of age for the children to sit down and watch.

This is a family oriented movie with romance, coming of age, adventure, pirates and comedy all rolled into one. My wife, 2 teenage daughters and my first grade son all enjoy this one as much as I do.