The Sea Chase (1955, United States)
The Sea Chase war movie
▼ MENU
The Sea Chase war movie
2024-04-07 / 1970-01-01
On the verge of World War 2 captain of German merchant ship tries to get back to homeland.
A little bit unusual movie for John Wayne - after long list of war movies in which he was tough-as-nails American officers plus beautiful women in scenes between the battles here we have Wayne as tough-as-nails German captain with beautiful woman aboard his ship. On the beginning of World War 2 German old steam freighter Ergenstrasse is about to leave port at Sydney, Australia to avoid being interned. Captain Ehrlich decides to slip out of harbour and try to make it back to Germany. Australian and British navy chase them, but Ehrlich has bigger problems than that - his ship doesn’t have enough coal and food for the voyage, so he has to find way to reach islands of South Pacific in order to resupply.
The story is based on events involving German steamer Erlangen that run away from the New Zealand port and made it to the South America avoiding British navy. He was intercepted near Montevideo and sunk by the crew. In The Sea Chase we also have a second subplot - onboard of Ergenstrasse is a beautiful woman that becomes involved with captain, which doesn’t actually add much value to the movie.
Just like other John Wayne movies this one also has some good points (beautiful scenery of South Pacific, gripping fight for survival of the crew) and some weak points (unnecessary romantic subplot, strange propaganda twists), so overall it isn’t bad, but could have been so much better.
Our rating
6.0
Film value
5 / 10
Realism factor
3 / 5
Adventure factor
4 / 5
Historical accuracy
3 / 5
