Master and Commander

[minaret]

Awful mangling rendition of one of my favorite series. Crowe as Aubrey? Please. And the guy they cast as Maturin, the central character for Chrissake, was even worse. Tripe.


All you fans, read Maryatt. Incredible work, O'Brian loosely based much of his work on Maryatt. It was written 1830's-1850's, but reads very contemporary. He was Conrad's favorite author, as well as Dickenson's.

[Greene]

Make sure to add Dewey Lambdin's Allen Lewrie series to your reading list this winter. Not quite as good as Lucky Jack, but definitely a little naughtier.

Mike

[Kevin84]

Originally Posted by ryon

They didn't exactly build the Surprise for the movie. She was redone from the HMS Rose Travels with the Tall Ship Rose

You can see her at the Maritime Museum of San Diego www.sdmaritime.org

My mistake. Got mixed up for a second.

Sent from my HTC6500LVW using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

[S/V Alchemy]

Originally Posted by Kevin84

That is a good movie. It loosely, very loosely, based on the Patrick O'Brien books. To make that movie, they built the HMS Surprise and for the French ship they used digital scans of the USS Constitution. Plus, well, Russel Crowe is a great actor.

Sent from my HTC6500LVW using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

It wasn't that loose. It combined two novels, HMS Surprise and whichever one featured chasing the French super-frigate (Reverse of the Medal?). Then they omitted the shoreside stuff, which many people would consider a bit draggy anyway.

I thought it was a very good treatment and really gave the flavour of O'Brien's works. I agree it was very well shot, and I thought Paul Whoozis did the difficult character of Maturin quite well, although he was too tall, too clean and too good-looking for the role! Maturin's always mentioned as appearing small, ratty and vaguely disreputable looking.

[S/V Alchemy]

Originally Posted by HopCar

If you enjoy the Aubrey books, you should try Bernard Cornwell's Sharpe series. If you enjoy the Sharpe series he has written a bunch of other historical novels.

Of course C.S. Forester sets the standard with the Hornblower series.
Hornblower could kick Aubrey's ass. That should get it started!

While I love O'Brien's series, I have to concur that Hornblower is probably better. I will give C.S. Forester this much: when Hornblower spends a year or so on the run inside France, the action is as compelling on land as when he's on the water. O'Brien did not pull the shoreside intrigue off as well, I think, much as I liked it.

[44'cruisingcat]

Loved the line about "The lesser of two weevils".

[minaret]

Originally Posted by 44'cruisingcat

Loved the line about "The lesser of two weevils".

How about "it's the dog watch because its curtailed"?

[brazenarticle]

I was unaware of Captain Frederick Maryatt, went online at Amazon and there are several of his books offered free for the kindle.
"The Works of Captain Marryatt" (note author listed as Captain, not Frederick) is a collection of works for 2.99
Looking forward to a lot of winter reading…..

[minaret]

Originally Posted by brazenarticle

I was unaware of Captain Frederick Maryatt, went online at Amazon and there are several of his books offered free for the kindle.
"The Works of Captain Marryatt" (note author listed as Captain, not Frederick) is a collection of works for 2.99
Looking forward to a lot of winter reading…..

Enjoy! You have quite a treat in store. Start with "Mr. Midshipman Easy" and work up to the likes of "Percival Keene".


Just want to point out that my iPad auto corrected "Dickens' " in the post above to Dickensons. When Charles Dickens tells people some guy you've never heard of is his favorite author, take note!

[Cormorant]

One more spelling note: It's Marryatt with two r's -- though you'll often see it spelled with only one t at the end. That'll help anyone searching for free e-books.

Check Gutenberg.org -- they've got tons:
http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/627

[minaret]

Originally Posted by Cormorant

One more spelling note: It's Marryatt with two r's -- though you'll often see it spelled with only one t at the end. That'll help anyone searching for free e-books.

Check Gutenberg.org -- they've got tons:
http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/627

Good note; I often make this mistake myself. Even though I have a collection of very old books by him.

[hoppy]

The first time I watched Master and Commander it was in my apartment on a projector and with the surround system turned up because it started just with dialogue.

When the canon fired though the fog to whole apartment shook and I had to dive for the remote

I never realised it was a Peter Weir movie

[roverhi]

Was disappointed with the movie. The beauty of the O'brien series was the relationship between Aubrey and Maturin. The movie almost totally ignored that. Read the books, way better.

FWIW, O'brien loosely based the Aubrey character on Sir Thomas Cochrane, 10th Earl of Dundonald. This larger than life character's biography reads like a Hollywood Movie Script on steroids. Among other things he was responsible for throwing the Spanish out of Peru, and also instrumental in the independence of Chile and Brazil. These exploits were after being cashiered out of the English Navy when he was convicted of trumped up stock fraud charges. He was later reinstated into the English Navy and attained the rank of Admiral of the Red. Sharpe's Devil by Cornwall is based on Cochran's exploits while in the Chilean Navy.

[minaret]

Originally Posted by roverhi

Was disappointed with the movie. The beauty of the O'brien series was the relationship between Aubrey and Maturin. The movie almost totally ignored that. Read the books, way better.

FWIW, O'brien loosely based the Aubrey character on Sir Thomas Cochrane, 10th Earl of Dundonald. This larger than life character's biography reads like a Hollywood Movie Script on steroids. Among other things he was responsible for throwing the Spanish out of Peru, and also instrumental in the independence of Chile and Brazil. These exploits were after being cashiered out of the English Navy when he was convicted of trumped up stock fraud charges. He was later reinstated into the English Navy and attained the rank of Admiral of the Red. Sharpe's Devil by Cornwall is based on Cochran's exploits while in the Chilean Navy.

Frederick Marryat was a midshipman under Cochrane and followed him for his entire naval career until he himself was made Post. He fought in over 50 naval battles at sea. He was almost cashiered from the Navy for some of his earlier works, which were written while he was on active duty, such as "The Kings Own", which addressed what he saw as problems with the Navy. He retired so he could pursue his writing career unfettered by Naval responsibility. Many of his early books were serialized in Browns and other popular periodicals of the day.

[minaret]

Anybody else watch the BBC series on Sharpe starring Sean Bean as the titular character? Terrible theme music and some other issues, no naval action, but still better than "Master & Commander". There are a lot of episodes, each one based on a Sharpe novel. Netflix has them.