Hero's Island | |
---|---|
Directed by | Leslie Stevens |
Written by | Leslie Stevens |
Produced by | James Mason Leslie Stevens |
Starring | James Mason Neville Brand Kate Manx Rip Torn Warren Oates Brendan Dillon |
Cinematography | Ted D. McCord |
Edited by | Richard K. Brockway |
Music by | Dominic Frontiere |
Production company | Daystar Productions |
Distributed by | United Artists |
Release date |
|
Running time | 94 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Hero's Island, also known as The Land We Love, is a 1962 American action film written and directed by Leslie Stevens. It stars James Mason, Neville Brand, Kate Manx, Rip Torn, Warren Oates and Brendan Dillon. It was released on September 16, 1962, by United Artists. [1] [2]
The film, set in the early 18th century, is about a poor family homesteading on a remote Carolina island, leading to encounters with seagoing vagabonds, good and bad. It was filmed on location on California's Santa Catalina Island, which is much hillier and more arid than any actual part of the coastal Carolinas.
In 1718 a recently freed family of indentured workers inherits the small uninhabited Bull Island off the Carolina coast. The family consist of husband and wife, one son, and a second son who they bought as a baby. The local fishermen who were already using the island think they own the island and attempt to force the family to leave, during which the husband is killed. The conflict over the island escalates as more people including a castaway, a fugitive from justice, and hired heavies join each side. Not everyone is who they seem or claim to be.
The Isle of Man had become physically separated from Great Britain and Ireland by 6500 BC. It appears that colonisation took place by sea sometime during the Mesolithic era. The island has been visited by various raiders and trading peoples over the years. After being settled by people from Ireland in the first millennium AD, the Isle of Man was converted to Christianity and then suffered raids by Vikings from Norway. After becoming subject to Norwegian suzerainty as part of the Kingdom of Mann and the Isles, the Isle of Man later became a possession of the Scottish and then the English crowns.
James Neville Mason was an English actor. He achieved considerable success in British cinema before becoming a star in Hollywood. He was the top box-office attraction in the UK in 1944 and 1945; his British films included The Seventh Veil (1945) and The Wicked Lady (1945). He starred in Odd Man Out (1947), the first recipient of the BAFTA Award for Best British Film.
Lawrence Neville Brand was an American soldier and actor. He was known for playing villainous or antagonistic character roles in Westerns, crime dramas, and films noir, and was nominated for a BAFTA Award for his performance in Riot in Cell Block 11 (1954).
Geraldine Sue Page was an American actress. With a career which spanned four decades across film, stage, and television, Page was the recipient of numerous accolades, including an Academy Award, a British Academy Film Award, two Primetime Emmy Awards, and two Golden Globe Awards, as well as nominations for four Tony Awards.
Elmore Rual "Rip" Torn Jr. was an American actor whose career spanned more than 60 years. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for playing Marsh Turner in Cross Creek (1983). Torn's portrayal of Artie the producer on The Larry Sanders Show (1993–1998) received six Emmy Award nominations, winning in 1996. Torn is also known for his roles as Judas Iscariot in King of Kings (1961), Thomas J. Finley, Jr. in Sweet Bird of Youth (1962), Dr. Nathan Bryce in The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976), Bob Diamond in Defending Your Life (1991), Zeus in Hercules (1997), Zed in the Men in Black franchise, Jim Brody in Freddy Got Fingered (2001), Patches O'Houlihan in Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story (2004), and Louis XV in Marie Antoinette (2006).
Leslie Clark Stevens IV was an American producer, writer, and director. He created two television series for the ABC network, The Outer Limits (1963–1965) and Stoney Burke (1962–63), and Search (1972–73) for NBC. Stevens was the director of the horror film Incubus (1966), which stars William Shatner, and was the second film to use the Esperanto language. He wrote an early work of New Age philosophy, est: The Steersman Handbook (1970).
Sidney Alderman Blackmer was an American Broadway and film actor active between 1914 and 1971, usually in major supporting roles.
Warren Mercer Oates was an American actor best known for his performances in several films directed by Sam Peckinpah, including The Wild Bunch (1969) and Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974). Another of his most acclaimed performances was as officer Sam Wood in In the Heat of the Night (1967). Oates starred in numerous films during the early 1970s that have since achieved cult status, such as The Hired Hand (1971), Two-Lane Blacktop (1971), and Race with the Devil (1975). Oates also portrayed John Dillinger in the biopic Dillinger (1973) and as the supporting character U.S. Army Sergeant Hulka in the military comedy Stripes (1981). Another notable appearance was in the classic New Zealand film Sleeping Dogs (1977), in which he played the commander of the American forces in the country.
John Blake Dillon was an Irish writer and politician who was one of the founding members of the Young Ireland movement.
Combat! is an American television drama that originally aired on ABC from 1962 until 1967. The exclamation point in Combat! was depicted on-screen as a stylized bayonet. The show covered the grim lives of a squad of American soldiers fighting the Germans in France during World War II. The first-season episode "A Day in June" shows D-Day as a flashback, hence the action occurs during and after June 1944. The program starred Rick Jason as platoon leader Second Lieutenant Gil Hanley and Vic Morrow as Sergeant "Chip" Saunders. Jason and Morrow would play the lead in alternating episodes in Combat!.
A Study in Terror is a 1965 British thriller film directed by James Hill and starring John Neville as Sherlock Holmes and Donald Houston as Dr. Watson. It was filmed at Shepperton Studios, London, with some location work at Osterley House in Middlesex.
Jeanette Nolan was an American actress. Nominated for four Emmy Awards, she had roles in the television series The Virginian (1962–1971) and Dirty Sally (1974), and in films such as Macbeth (1948).
Robert Dorning was an English musician, dance band vocalist, ballet dancer and stage, film and television actor. He is known to have performed in at least 77 television and film productions between 1940 and 1988.
Keppel Gate, Isle of Man is part of a former UK HM Commissioners of Woods and Forest estate, including a series of former highway mountain gates. It is now Common land in public ownership and is one of three purpose built former Crown Road sections of the A18 Snaefell Mountain Road used for the Isle of Man TT races. The area of Keppel Gate including a nearby private residence of Kate's Cottage at the adjacent 34th TT Milestone road-side marker is located between the 4th Milestone and 5th Milestone road-side markers on the primary A18 Snaefell Mountain Road in the parish district of Kirk Onchan in the Isle of Man.
Get Lost! is a British television drama serial made by Yorkshire Television in 1981 for the ITV network. Written by Alan Plater, the plot concerns the disappearance of the husband of Leeds schoolteacher Judy Threadgold. Investigating the disappearance, with the aid of her colleague, woodwork teacher Neville Keaton, Judy learns of the existence of a secret organisation that helps disaffected people leave their unhappy lives behind.
Enda Oates, occasionally credited as Enda Oats, is an Irish stage, film, and television actor. He has received attention for his stagework, but is best known to Irish television audiences as the Reverend George Black in the long-running series Glenroe for RTÉ, and as Barreller Casey in the sitcom Upwardly Mobile.
Songwriter is a 1984 American film directed by Alan Rudolph. At the 57th Academy Awards, it received an Oscar nomination for Best Original Song Score and Its Adaptation or Adaptation Score for Kris Kristofferson.
Girls on Probation is a 1938 American crime film directed by William C. McGann and written by Crane Wilbur. The film stars Jane Bryan, Ronald Reagan, Anthony Averill, Sheila Bromley, Henry O'Neill and Elisabeth Risdon. The film was released by Warner Bros. on August 22, 1938.
Private Property, sometimes known as Private Property!, is a 1960 American independent crime film, directed by Leslie Stevens and starring Corey Allen, Warren Oates and Kate Manx.
Jane "Jenny" Mitchel was an Irish nationalist who joined her husband, John Mitchel, in exile in the United States where, with their sons, they sided on a pro-slavery platform with the secessionist South in the Civil War.