In Search of the Castaways
In Search of the Castaways
G | 01 December 1962 (USA)
In Search of the Castaways Trailers

Two teenagers, Mary (Hayley Mills) and Robert (Keith Hamshere) are lead by Professor Paganel (Maurice Chevalier) on a search expedition for the children's shipwrecked sea captain father. This Disney film was based upon Jules Verne's 1868 adventure novel Captain Grant's Children.

Reviews
Stevecorp Don't listen to the negative reviews
Stellead Don't listen to the Hype. It's awful
Peereddi I was totally surprised at how great this film.You could feel your paranoia rise as the film went on and as you gradually learned the details of the real situation.
Myron Clemons A film of deceptively outspoken contemporary relevance, this is cinema at its most alert, alarming and alive.
Lars-Toralf Storstrand To destroy an epic adventure as Jules Verne's "The Children of Captain Grant" in such a way - is a crime that cannot be pardoned. The twist of the history in the beginning, the drop-outs of large parts of the history, and the cheap stage settings is not even worthy for a studio like Walt Disney.Now of course some would excuse this to the lack of special effects compared to today, but that is really no real excuse. In Norway, the book wasn't even translated and published in complete edition to 2013, but this is shameful. To destroy a major literary work like this is ... well I really don't have words for it.I am shocked.
ma-cortes A journey looking for captain Grant (Jack Gwillim) is realized by a teenage girl Hayley Mills (Pollyanna), her little boy brother along with two veterans (Wilfrid Hyde White and singer Maurice Chevalier) and a young man (Michael Anderson Jr.) . During the long travel they find natural disasters as earthquake in the Andes , fire and flood in the ocean and volcano in New Zealand and they attempt to overcome . Besides they encounter different tribes as Araucans (an Indian chief played by Antonio Cifariello ), Patagons (Argentina) and Maoris (New Zealand).The picture contains adventures , humor , emotion , songs , stirring action and sensational outdoors . The film displays some scenes have you on the edge of your seat as the amusing images when the protagonists sledge over floe . Excellent , powerful cast with sympathetic Hayley Mills and Maurice Chevalier and with the cynic George Sanders . Colorful cinematography reflecting marvellous landscapes by Paul Beeson . Lively and evocative music by Willyam Alwyn . Abounds matte painting and special effects by the Disney specialist Peter Ellenshaw . It's a winning Disney effort made by its usual director Robert Stevenson (Herbie , gnome mobile , Mary Poppins) . It's a must for the Disney fans but is beautifully released , being recommendable for all family and especially for little boys public . Rating : Good and entertaining.
Nick Zegarac (movieman-200) Based upon Jule's Vernes 'Captain Grant's Children', In Search of Those Castaways (1962) is an incoherent yarn about Mary Grant (Haley Mills), the determined daughter of a missing sea captain (Jack Gwillim) who sets about traveling to exotic ports and hidden mysterious locales in search of dear IL' daddy. On this trip she takes family friend and confident, Jacque Paganell (the marvelous Maurice Chevalier) and meets up with the unscrupulous and hardened, Thomas Ayerton (George Sanders). The cast also includes Wilfred Hyde-White as the stuffy Lord Glenaravan and Michael Anderson Jr. as his son John. But Robert Stevenson's direction on this occasion seems to fall apart on a series of vignettes that have no coherent or driving narrative. Verne's works usually present this sort of problem for screenwriters, in that Verne himself often wrote episodic stories that later became loosely strung together as fantasy novels of their day; visionary – then; stagnant and wholly unappealing by 1960s standards; completely out of touch by today's expectations. Peter Ellenshaw's matte paintings extend the world of fantasy that Mary and company traverse to good effect. There's some great trick photography taking place during the flood sequence. There's also Chevalier warbling a very family friendly little ditty, 'Enjoy it.' In the end, it seems hard to take up Chevalier on that musical request. The end of the story is a forgone conclusion by reel two. We know Mary's going to find her father; it's a Disney film. There seems to be some discrepancy as to the proper aspect ratio for this film; 1:33:1 or 1:75:1. The theatrical prints appear to have been printed in the latter format since title credit sequences on this DVD occasionally run off the top and bottom of the screen. However, an usual practice occurred in the late 1960s and early 70s in American cinema, whereby certain films were shot in full frame for the sake of economy and then artificially cropped to 1:75:1 for theatrical presentation. Having explained this; the print for In Search of Those Castaways might very well have been one such film, with title sequences specifically formatted for the 1:75:1 theatrical engagement. Hence, when Disney remastered the DVD they forgot to format the titles for 1:33:1 to avoid confusion. At the very least, these credits have not been framed properly. At worst, Disney has given us another full frame only version of a widescreen movie. Yet, for the rest of the presentation, everything looks pretty much as it should. There is no apparent cropping to speak of and scenes appear quite natural in 1:33:1. As for the rest of the image quality: colors are quite solid, pure and rich. Blacks are deep. Whites are generally clean. Film grain is present during the matte shots but absent elsewhere for a picture that will surely not disappoint. The audio is engaging, if dated.
moonspinner55 Wonderful Jules Verne fantasy via Walt Disney has jolly, ne'er-do-well Frenchman Maurice Chevalier helping two children convince a ship's captain that the kids' father, a captain lost at sea, is shipwrecked on an island near South America. The journey begins, and soon the whole gang faces every form of a raging Mother Nature trying to reach the castaway. Hayley Mills is near the peak of her ladylike charms here, never lovelier than when singing "Castaway" under the stars by guitar or cooking breakfast with Chevalier in a treetop. Maurice himself is a wily coot, and Wilfred Hyde-White is brusquely amusing. Well-produced yarn with fine effects does tail off in the second-half, but there are many requisite Disney-adventure pleasures to be had. Enjoy it! *** from ****