Glimmerubro It is not deep, but it is fun to watch. It does have a bit more of an edge to it than other similar films.

Ketrivie It isn't all that great, actually. Really cheesy and very predicable of how certain scenes are gonna turn play out. However, I guess that's the charm of it all, because I would consider this one of my guilty pleasures.

Stephan Hammond It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

Mehdi Hoffman There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.

ma-cortes From the great suspense Best Seller about the ghost ship Mary Deare based on the novel written by Hammond Innes , being well scripted by prestigious Eric Ambler . This intriguing as well as exciting flick packs crisp performance , thrilling scenes , suspense , courtroom drama , twists and turns . This interesting sea adventure focusing on a wreck is set in the British Channel , there John Sands (Charlton Heston ) along with his colleague , from a small rescue ship called ¨Sea Witch¨ , meet the freighter Mary Deare drifting . Although there's only a little fire , the whole crew seems to have left the vessel ; however there is an officer , the only crew member on board . John's already looking forward to a large salvage fee , but then he meets a first officer named Patch (Gary Cooper) still on board . Sands can't get back to his tug boat and stays with Patch while Patch grounds the Mary Deare . Although he doesn't understand yet what happened on the Mary Deare , Sands allows Patch to persuade him not to talk about what he saw on board and to drag out the official investigation of the incident . Patch in order to prove his innocence and to vindicate his good name decides to investigate the deeds and as a result the events go wrong . This is a alright suspense movie in Hitchcockian style where intrigue , tension , suspense appear threatening and lurking in every corridors and interior and exterior from a freighter . The best scenes turned to be when the stars appeared at end of the film in underwater scenarios and fighting enemies . ¨The wreck of the Mary Deare¨ originally was to be shot by Alfred Hitchcock but he turned down the offer to make ¨North by Northwest¨ . Almost all the studio work for the film was done in Hollywood, with California-based Britishers playing supporting parts . However , the lengthy scene of the inquiry was filmed in Britain, following a small amount of British location work ; London-based actors and a British crew were employed for these scenes . Nice acting by Gary Cooper as a disgraced merchant marine first officer called Gerald Patch who elects to stay aboard his sinking cargo ship to demonstrate the ship was deliberately scuttled . However , Cooper had frequent illnesses during the shooting . Good performance from Heston , as usual , as a boat salvager who comes up a seemingly empty ship one night . Heston was impressed that Gary Cooper still performed his own stunts , including remaining submerged for long periods of time, despite his age and obvious ill health . Richard Harris hated the constant delays while making the film so much that he refused to return to Hollywood for five years . Very good support cast formed by notorious English actors such as Michael Redgrave , Emlyn Williams , Cecil Parker , Alexander Knox , Virginia McKenna and John Le Mesusier . Evocative as well as atmospheric musical score by George Duning . Rousing and colorful cinematography in Technicolor by Joseph Ruttenberg . This overlong motion picture was compellingly directed by Michael Anderson , plenty of thrills , action , twists , breathtaking production design with great scale models , and being pretty entertaining though with some feeble stereotypes and flaws . Michael Anderson is a British veteran filmmaker, a director and assistant director, who shot all kinds of genres , especially known for Shoes of fisherman (1965) , Operation crossbow (1968) , Doc Savage (1975) , Logan's run (1976), Around the world on 80 days (1956) and The Dam Busters (1955) , Milennium (1989) .

Scarecrow-88 Cooper retains his commanding on screen presence in his shared screen time with the rising star, Charlton Heston, in this moderately entertaining adventure/courtroom drama. Cooper is an acting captain, Gideon Patch, abandoned by his crew as the cargo vessel, The Mary Deare, is apparently on its way to sinking. Salvagers, including Heston's Sands, see the ship and plan to possibly attain from it whatever value it might hold. Sands doesn't expect to meet Patch on board considering how badly maligned it looks, but that isn't even the beginning of what he will be a part of before the film is over.Airplane parts that were to be transported are believed by Patch to be the reason behind systematic ruination of the Mary Deare (explosions, among other potentially purposeful acts to sink the ship). When confronting his captain about the criminal activity he considers by the crew, Patch is dismissively defied of his concerns. What happens between Patch and this captain, how the crew leave the ship under suspicious circumstances, why Patch would want to purposely drive the Mary Deare into the dangerous French Les Minquiers coral reefs to conceal its location, a British court inquiry on what happened to the ship (and on board it), Patch's abilities at commanding a water vessel of any kind, Patch's needed alliance with a jaded Sands who continues to trust less and less in the *man alone*, and the eventual return to the Mary Deare of Patch to prove his theory is correct about the reason behind sinking the ship to Sands all factor as key plot developments that drive this film. Heston does show here it was only a matter of time before he would be a big star (Ben Hur was this same year), but he concedes to the absolute star power of a dying Cooper who is still a charismatic icon. I think the best part of the film is the opening of it as the friction between Cooper and Heston's characters are heightened by the ship's condition and ongoing weather conditions both dangerous to them (accompanied by the approaching coral reefs, as well). The ship itself looks quite damaged, taking on water and looking quite aged. Heston trying to help keep the ship from total decline and eventual sinking while Cooper seems dead set on beaching the Mary Deare produces hotheaded back-and-forth. I like that there's this obvious gradual build up of respect although distrust during the trial somewhat fractures the good will starting to emerge between the two macho stars.That integrity and pursuit of proving that a greedy slug named Higgins (a young Richard Harris) was chief among the crew in helping his company sink the Mary Deare really establishes another Coop character so symbolic to that very recognizable archetype he was known for throughout his career. Seemingly a man with the whole world against him, this is the kind of part that seems fitting at the very end of Coop's career (he'd be dead the very next year). Coop's assertive nature at the beginning as Heston inadvertently stumbles onto a major situation when boarding his ship, the latter becoming an unwitting participant in the Mary Deare's beaching and secretive location is intriguing. Also I think you can understand why Heston's salvager would be puzzled and frustrated with Coop's acting captain, particularly as the treatment and hidden agenda of the Mary Deare is concerned. The courtroom portion of the film, I understand, is important to build the plot and place Coop under a lot of scrutiny, but it kind of grounds the film after that really adventurous, thrilling opening involving the cargo ship and how it was under a severe deterioration due to how the crew treated her. I think Cooper gains our sympathy as a wronged man trying to identify a crime and use the inquiry as a means to expose corruption. The insurance that would've made the company a lot of money due to the ship's sinking thanks to the pricey cargo, Coop is up against a powerful entity. This isn't a bad MGM product, even if its superb opening kind of loses momentum when the two men return to land for the inquiry. Michael Redgraves is rather wasted as a lawyer, but Ben Wright is amusing as the tug boat captain of Heston's salvager, The Sea Witch. Wright has one of those captains who listens to everything his ship's mate has to say, and he's always around during the whole Mary Deare business as it involved a salvage so possibly valuable. While a capitalist, Wright's tugboat captain becomes a crucial ally to Cooper when all is said and done thanks to Sands' involvement. The stuffy inquiry and how Coop seems guilty by everyone, trying but failing to emphasize his innocence and spotlight criminal behavior through the series of happenings on the Mary Deare produces that gulp in the throat that proves its worth to the overall presentation of the film.

blanche-2 Gary Cooper and Charlton Heston star in "The Wreck of the Mary Deare," along with an incredible supporting cast including Richard Harris, Michael Redgrave, Alexander Knox, and Emlyn Williams. The reason for such a cast? The original director was to be Alfred Hitchcock.Heston plays John Sands, captain of a small rescue ship, who finds the freighter Mary Deare drifting. The crew seems to have abandoned the ship, but there's one person left, the first officer Gideon Patch. What happened on board isn't certain, but Patch begs Sands not to say anything about the ship until there is an official investigation and the ship is examined by an objective third party. Sands goes along, though this means not telling anyone that ship hasn't sunk, as people are led to believe, but that it is on the Minquiries Islands.Very good drama, with a screenplay by suspense writer Eric Ambler. The shipboard atmosphere and storm sequences are great, and the performances are strong. Despite filming shutdowns due to Gary Cooper being ill, you wouldn't know it from his fiery portrayal of Patch, whose reputation and career are on the line. Heston does very well opposite him.This is really the best of Gary Cooper's last few films. He only made one film after this, The Naked Edge, released in 1961 after his death, and that was a bomb. By that point, he had to stop filming frequently to get oxygen. He was ill while making "Mary Deare," but probably didn't realize that he had cancer. Amazing that he worked to the very end. He deservedly died the huge star that he had been for 30-plus years.Very good movie, suspenseful, with great performances, atmosphere, and effects.

sol1218 ***SPOILERS*** Seeing this cargo ship on fire and adrift in the stormy English Channel salvage tugboat Captain of the "Sea Witch" John Sands, Charlton Heston, decided to get on board and investigate to see if anyone is still alive on the boat. To his shock and amazement Sands is attacked, from out of nowhere, by this wild eyed and hysterical man who claims that he's the ship's only survivor! The what seemed like crazy man turned out to be the ship's third mate Gideon Patch, Cary Cooper,and the ship he's now in charge of is the "Mary Deare".Wih the "Mary Deare" taking on water and Sands stranded on it it's now up to Patch to steer it to the safely of the nearest French port. For some strange reason Patch beaches the "Mary Deare" on the treacherous Minquiers, or Minkies in English, coral reef off the Channel Islands! Patch is keeping what he knows about the "Mary Deare" secret planning to reveal what he knows at a naval court of inquiry. What's even more bizarre about Patch's actions he want's the totally ignorant Sands, who just went along for the ride, to play along with him! Even if by doing that would cost him his master ticket to be a ship captain! As we, and Sands, later find out there is a method to Patch's madness in his paranoia of what the purpose behind the "Mary Deare" string of accident that started when it left port in Rangoon Burma. ***SPOILERS***It secretly switched its cargo of jet aircraft engines to another cargo ship docked there. That ship just happened to belong to the Peoples Republic of Communist Red China!Patch knows that as long as the "Mary Deare" remains in tact he can prove that there was a plan by it's owner Grunderson, Peter Illing, to sell its cargo of airplane engines to the Communist Red Chinese and then have the ship sunk by a series of staged accidents by it's officer in charge Captain Taggart. The fact that Patch prevented that from happening has put him on the hot seat for being an incompetent sea captain as well as a possible accomplice, in Captain Taggart's mysterious death, to murder. The only way he can clear his name is have the ship-the "Mary Deare- checked for its cargo that which Patch, by having it stranded on the Minkies, has everyone thinking that it's at the bottom of the English Channel. By having the ship being investigated by a naval board of inquiry would prevent Grunderson's paid off goons lead by Higgins, Richard Harris, from making sure that it, and its missing cargo of jet engines, never get to see the light of day!P.S Even though at first intimidated by his co-star in the film Gary Cooper, whom he idolized, Charlton Heston held his own and in some scenes even eclipsed the legendary two time Academy Award winning actor. The movie turned out to be one of the last films the great Gary Cooper would ever make. Not knowing it at the time Gary Cooper was suffering from the early stages of terminal cancer that would eventually take his life two years later in May 1961 at the age of 60.