''Savage Islands'' (also known as ''Nate and Hayes'' in the United States) is a 1983

swashbuckling A swashbuckler is a genre of European adventure literature that focuses on a heroic protagonist stock character who is skilled in swordsmanship, acrobatics, guile and possesses chivalrous ideals. A "swashbuckler" protagonist is heroic, daring, ...

adventure film An adventure film is a form of adventure fiction, and is a genre of film. Subgenres of adventure films include swashbuckler films, pirate films, and survival films. Adventure films may also be combined with other film genres such as action, ani ...

set in the

South Pacific The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the continen ...

in the late 19th century. Directed by Ferdinand Fairfax and filmed on location in

Fiji Fiji ( , ,; fj, Viti, ; Fiji Hindi: फ़िजी, ''Fijī''), officially the Republic of Fiji, is an island country in Melanesia, part of Oceania in the South Pacific Ocean. It lies about north-northeast of New Zealand. Fiji consis ...

and New Zealand, it starred

Tommy Lee Jones Tommy Lee Jones (born September 15, 1946) is an American actor and film director. He has received four Academy Award nominations, winning Best Supporting Actor for his performance as U.S. Marshal Samuel Gerard in the 1993 thriller film '' T ...

Michael O'Keefe Michael O'Keefe (born Raymond Peter O'Keefe, Jr.; April 24, 1955) is an American actor, known for his roles as Danny Noonan in '' Caddyshack'', Ben Meechum in '' The Great Santini,'' for which he received a nomination for the Academy Award for B ...

and Jenny Seagrove. It was one of several 1980s films designed to capitalize on the popularity of ''

Indiana Jones ''Indiana Jones'' is an American media franchise based on the adventures of Dr. Henry Walton "Indiana" Jones, Jr., a fictional professor of archaeology, that began in 1981 with the film '' Raiders of the Lost Ark''. In 1984, a prequel, '' Th ...

'', but ''Savage Islands'' was a flop at the box office.

Plot

The film tells the story of missionary Nathaniel "Nate" Williamson, taken to an island mission with his fiancée Sophie. Their ship, the ''Rona'', is captained by the roguish William "Bully" Hayes, who also takes a liking to Sophie. When Sophie is kidnapped by slave trader Ben Pease, "Nate" teams with Hayes in order to find her. The two men enjoy a friendly rivalry for Sophie's affections, and she is to some extent torn between them, though committed to Nate.

Cast

Bully Hayes William Henry "Bully" Hayes (1827 or 1829 – 31 March 1877) was a notorious American ship's captain who engaged in blackbirding in the 1860s and 1870s.James A. Michener & A. Grove Day, ''Bully Hayes, South Sea Buccaneer'', in ''Rascals in Parad ...

as Nathaniel Williamson *

Max Phipps Maxwell John Phipps (18 November 1939 – 6 August 2000) was an Australian actor, known for a number of roles in theatre, films and television during the 1960s until the end of the 1990s. Life and career Phipps was born in Dubbo and grew up i ...

as Ben Pease * Jenny Seagrove as Sophie * Grant Tilly as Count von Rittenberg *

Peter Rowley Peter Rowley (sometimes credited as Harrison Rowley during his early career) (born April 29, 1952) is a New Zealand comic actor and writer. He is best known for his television roles, where he has played in numerous popular television series as c ...

as Louis Beck *

Prince Tui Teka Tumanako "Tui" Teka (8 March 193723 January 1985), better known by his stage names Tui Latui or Prince Tui Teka was a Māori singer and actor. Teka was a member of the Maori Volcanics Showband before having a successful solo career. Career T ...

as King of Ponape

Production

The story was based on the adventures of real-life blackbirders

and Ben Pease. The character of Hayes was much softened in the film and Pease turned into a villain. The script was rewritten by John Hughes. The director was Ferdinand Fairfax, an Englishman most recently notable for his direction of the television series, ''Churchill — The Wilderness Years''. Fairfax described the film as a tongue-in-cheek adventure in the style of ''

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid ''Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid'' is a 1969 American Western buddy film directed by George Roy Hill and written by William Goldman. Based loosely on fact, the film tells the story of Wild West outlaws Robert LeRoy Parker, known as Butch C ...

''. "I'm not making '' Carry on Pirates'' or anything like that, but I think it will be a very funny film", he said. The film was entirely financed with New Zealand money but achieved distribution in the US. Producer Phillips raised money in part on the back of the success of his short film, ''

Dollar Bottom ''The Dollar Bottom'' is a 1981 British short film directed by Roger Christian. It won an Oscar at the 53rd Academy Awards The 53rd Academy Awards ceremony, organized by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), honored fi ...

''. The film was shot in

Rotorua Rotorua () is a city in the Bay of Plenty region of New Zealand's North Island. The city lies on the southern shores of Lake Rotorua, from which it takes its name. It is the seat of the Rotorua Lakes District, a territorial authority encomp ...

and

Urupukapuka Island Urupukapuka Island is the largest island in the Bay of Islands of New Zealand, located about 7.3 km from Paihia. The island is a popular stopover point for tour boats to the Hole in the Rock and is also serviced by ferries for day trips f ...

. At Urupukapuka, the producers built a set reconstructing the Port of Samoa.

Release and reception

The film has a cult following which seems to have encouraged the release of the film on Region 1 and Region 2 DVD, in June and November 2006 respectively.

Reception

In his review,

Roger Ebert Roger Joseph Ebert (; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American film critic, film historian, journalist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, Ebert beca ...

gave the film one star and called it 'inexplicable', criticizing the tone and plot. The ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' gave plaudits to the performances, but felt the film was 'no fun at all', criticizing the inconsistent action and production values.

Colin Greenland Colin Greenland (born 17 May 1954 in Dover, Kent, England) is a British science fiction writer, whose first story won the second prize in a 1982 Faber & Faber competition. His best-known novel is ''Take Back Plenty'' (1990), winner of both majo ...

reviewed ''Savage Islands'' for '' Imagine'' magazine, and stated that "''Savage Islands'' doesn't have quite the pace or panache of ''

Raiders of the Lost Ark ''Raiders of the Lost Ark'' is a 1981 American action-adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg and written by Lawrence Kasdan, based on a story by George Lucas and Philip Kaufman. It stars Harrison Ford, Karen Allen, Paul Freeman, Ro ...

'', but it is first-class nonsense."

Legacy

Sir Richard Taylor of Weta Workshop said ''Savage Islands'' kick-started the New Zealand filmmaking boom of the 1980s. ''Savage Islands'' inspired

Lawrence Watt-Evans Lawrence Watt-Evans (born 1954) is one of the pseudonyms of American science fiction and fantasy author Lawrence Watt Evans (another pseudonym, used primarily for science fiction, is Nathan Archer). Biography Born in Arlington, Massachusetts, as ...

to write the 1992 novella ''The Final Folly of Captain Dancy''.'How I Came to Write "The Final Folly of Captain Dancy"'
at Watt-Evans.com; by

; published December 2008; retrieved June 4, 2013

References

External links

*
''Savage Islands''
at New Zealand On Screen * *

at DVD Savant {{DEFAULTSORT:Savage Islands 1983 films 1980s New Zealand films 1983 drama films 1980s adventure films Action films based on actual events Films scored by Trevor Jones Films set in the 1860s Films set in the 1870s Films shot in Fiji Films with screenplays by John Hughes (filmmaker) New Zealand adventure films Paramount Pictures films Pirate films Seafaring films Films directed by Ferdinand Fairfax Films with screenplays by David Odell