The Last Voyage

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The Last Voyage
TheLastVoyagePoster.jpg
theatrical release poster
Directed by Andrew L. Stone
Written byAndrew L. Stone
Produced byAndrew L. Stone
Virginia L. Stone
Starring Robert Stack
Dorothy Malone
George Sanders
Edmond O'Brien
Cinematography Hal Mohr
Edited byVirginia L. Stone
Music byRudy Schrager
Uncredited:
Andrew L. Stone
Virginia L. Stone
Production
company
Andrew L. Stone Inc. [1]
Distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Release dates
  • February 19, 1960 (1960-02-19)(New York City)
  • February 24, 1960 (1960-02-24)(Los Angeles) [1]
Running time
91 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$1,370,000 [2] or $1 million [3]
Box office$2,060,000 [2] [4]

The Last Voyage is a 1960 Metrocolor American disaster film starring Robert Stack, Dorothy Malone, George Sanders, and Edmond O'Brien.

Contents

It was written and directed by Andrew L. Stone. [5] [6]

The film centers on the sinking of an aged ocean liner in the Pacific Ocean following an explosion in its boiler room.

The ship used in the film was the condemned French luxury liner SS Ile de France, which played a major role in rescue operations during the 1956 Andrea Doria disaster.

Plot

The SS Claridon is an aging transpacific ocean liner, scheduled to be scrapped after just a few more voyages. Cliff (Robert Stack) and Laurie Henderson (Dorothy Malone), and their daughter, Jill (Tammy Marihugh), are relocating to Tokyo and decide to sail there on board the ship. A fire in the boiler room is extinguished, but not before a boiler fuel supply valve is fused open. Before Chief Engineer Pringle (Jack Kruschen) can manually open a steam relief valve, a huge explosion rips through the boiler room, the many decks situated above it, and the side of the ship. Pringle and a number of passengers are killed, and Laurie is trapped under a steel beam in their cabin.

Cliff runs back there and can't get Laurie out alone. He then finds Jill trapped on the other side of the cabin. He tries to use a shattered piece of the bed to get to the other side, but it falls into the hole made by the explosion. Third Officer Osborne believes that the crew should start loading the passengers into the lifeboats, but Captain Robert Adams (George Sanders) is reluctant, as he never lost a ship. Cliff rescues Jill by placing a board for her to crawl across the hole on. Down in the boiler room, Second Engineer Walsh (Edmond O'Brien) reports to Captain Adams that a seam to the bulkhead has broken away. Cliff tries to get a steward's help, but to no avail. A passenger states that he overheard his conversation and wants to help.

Osborne (George Furness) reports that the boiler room is now half full. The ship then begins to transmit an SOS, on orders of Captain Adams. Cliff and a few other men return to his cabin to try to help free Laurie but find that they need a cutting torch.

The carpenter reports to the crew that the boiler room is now two-thirds full. Captain Adams makes an announcement to the passengers to put on their life jackets, and soon after orders they begin loading and launching the lifeboats.

Cliff finds a torch and tries to rush back to Laurie with the help of crewman Hank Lawson (Woody Strode), but they still need an acetylene tank. On instruction from Cliff, Lawson puts Jill in a lifeboat and asks him to return with an acetylene tank. The bulkhead between the boiler room and the engine finally gives way, causing the ship to sink lower. On top of that, a second explosion occurs in the cargo hold, blowing off the cargo hatch on the bow of the ship.

Captain Adams is looking at his promotion letter to commodore of the line while Laurie holds a piece of a shattered mirror in her hand, contemplating suicide to free Cliff from risking his life to save her. She chooses not to do so and tosses it away.

When Cliff and Lawson are in the dining room, it also floods, causing water to burst through the large windows. Captain Adams returns to his office to retrieve the ship's logbook and papers but is killed when the forward smokestack falls on him. Meanwhile, Cliff finally gets the acetylene tank and gets Laurie out from under the steel beam with the help of Lawson and Walsh. They get up to the boat deck along with Osborne and Ragland. As they proceed to the stern where a lifeboat is standing by, Walsh jumps off the ship and swims away from it. Cliff, Laurie, Osborne, Ragland, and Lawson jump into the water and find a lifeboat just as the ship sinks. Cliff personally helps Lawson aboard, in thanks for his devotion to assisting Laurie's rescue, and the narrator concludes with, "This was the death of the steamship Claridon. This was her last voyage."

Cast