Based on Robert Ardrey's 1939 play, THUNDER ROCK is somewhat hard to describe. It is a charming, thought-provoking, anti-Fascist, fantasy ghost story set on a remote lighthouse on Lake Michigan. It stars Ralph Richardson and Barbara Mullen, with able assists from James Mason and Lilli Palmer.
Richardson plays David Charleston, a disillusioned journalist who is now the sole living resident of the lighthouse. When it was discovered that Charleston had not been cashing his paychecks, Charleston's old friend goes to the lighthouse to investigate. Charleston, it seems, is not alone in the lighthouse -- he is joined by the ghosts of a group of immigrants who had perished in a shipwreck ninety years before. The problem is that the ghost do not know they are dead. Are the ghosts real, or are the the figments of Charleston's imagination?
One on-line review states it pretty well: "It has more meaning and human pathos than most World War II propaganda films as it is not anti-enemy but pro-spirit and persistence."
Although the film is Richardson's -- and he gives a great performance -- the film is elevated by the appearance of James Mason, as he has done in every movie he has been in.
The original play flopped in its Broadway debut but had great success in England, where it ran for months in the West End. The film fared much better in America, where it was a box office success, playing to packed houses in New York for over three months.
Directed by John Boulting, and produced by his brother Roy Boulting, the film is graced by a script by Bernard Miles and Jeffrey Dell.
Worth your time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UwlHVsoX_aw
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