X
- 1963
- Not Rated
- Continental Distributing
- 1 h 32 m
- 1963
- Not Rated
- Continental Distributing
- 1 h 32 m
Summary Lost on an island, young survivors of a plane crash eventually revert to savagery despite the few rational boys' attempts to prevent that.
Directed By: Peter Brook
Written By: William Golding, Peter Brook
- 1963
- Not Rated
- Continental Distributing
- 1 h 32 m
- 1963
- Not Rated
- Continental Distributing
- 1 h 32 m
Lord of the Flies
67
5.9
Where to Watch
Summary Lost on an island, young survivors of a plane crash eventually revert to savagery despite the few rational boys' attempts to prevent that.
Directed By: Peter Brook
Written By: William Golding, Peter Brook
Where to Watch
Top Cast
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 9 Critic Reviews
67
56% Positive
5 Reviews
5 Reviews
44% Mixed
4 Reviews
4 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 9 Critic Reviews
67
56% Positive
5 Reviews
5 Reviews
44% Mixed
4 Reviews
4 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Brook renders savagery with the despairing eye of a humanist, and with the irresolvable ambivalence of an artist.
As it stands, Brook’s adaptation is an encroaching nightmare of innocence lost, following Golding’s thesis about what happens when civilization breaks down and man’s true nature is revealed.
User Score
Mixed or Average
Based on 11 User Ratings
5.9
64% Positive
7 Ratings
7 Ratings
9% Mixed
1 Rating
1 Rating
27% Negative
3 Ratings
3 Ratings
User Score
Mixed or Average
Based on 11 User Ratings
5.9
64% Positive
7 Ratings
7 Ratings
9% Mixed
1 Rating
1 Rating
27% Negative
3 Ratings
3 Ratings
The scariest aspect of the story as told by the book, and in this case the film, is how little it takes to jump right into the void of anarchy and chaos.
Sure, Lord of the Flies is mostly a tale of innocence lost, but it's more disturbing when you think that it's their very innocence what stopped them from greater evil.
It's never pleasant when the true nature of man is revealed.
Even for the time of this film's release, the impact of the message is not at all diluted.
The performances are really unremarkable, none of the guys do anything special. The spotlight belongs to the story and for this film that's all that matters.
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[SPOILER ALERT: This review contains spoilers.]
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William Golding’s tale of public schoolboys stranded on a desert island is an iconic depiction of fundamental savagery. More than fifty years on, Peter Brook’s 1963 Lord of the Flies remains the definitive film, its hallucinogenic brutality as terrifying as ever.
Brook knows he can't have his 10- to 12-year-olds mouthing philosophical and poetic paragraphs, so he shoots it like a documentary, overcoming the starvation budget, the location problems, and the sometimes awkward performances. However, the principals are excellent.
The theme of young boys reverting to savagery when marooned on a deserted island has its moments of truth, but this pic rates as a near-miss on many counts.
A curiously flat and fragmentary visualization of the original.
William Golding's 1954 allegory on man's innate inhumanity is too facile by half, which makes it ideal for high school English classes but rather too gaseous and predictable for the movies.
This adaptation gets the foundations of William Golding's classic right, and pairs it with phenomenal acting and technical brilliance behind the camera.
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Le livre dont il est tiré est sûrement plus intéressant, car en matière d’amateurisme et de maladresse, « Sa Majesté des Mouches » est à citer en exemple : on dirait un mauvais téléfilm boulotté à la dernière minute par deux stagiaires. Il est en effet incroyablement poussif et peine énormément à illustrer son propos.
Les mômes sont livrés à eux-mêmes et on a bien davantage l’impression d’un reportage sur une colonie de vacances que de mômes véritablement abandonnés sur leur île déserte comme autant de **** Robinson…
Tout ça pour dire quoi au juste ? eh bien, le film s’échine à démontrer l’évidence (comme si on pouvait encore l’ignorer) que des **** laissés à eux-mêmes sombrent dans l’anarchie et finissent comme une tribu de sauvages dégénérés avec moult dérapages à la clé. Rien que du très normal de chez standard, pas de quoi s’en émouvoir.
Evidemment, les angélistes seront sans doute choqués, puisque ce « vivre ensemble »-là de ces chers enfants n’est pas compatible avec l’idée qu’ils s’en faisaient (heal the world, Michael Jackson tout ça… quoique, pas si bon exemple en fait…). En tout cas, si cela se produisait de nos jours, ce serait assurément bien pire, vu l’éducation totalement à la dérive et quasiment inexistante de nos chères « têtes blondes » (plus vraiment blondes) qui baignent dans le socialo-communisme angéliste.
Le film a donc au moins le mérite d’exister et de défricher le terrain mais guère plus que cela. Sinon, pour voir le même avec des ados -et en bien fait cette fois- voir du côté de l’excellent premier Battle Royale (bien meilleur que le manga d’ailleurs !).
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Awards
National Board of Review, USA
• 1 Win & 1 Nomination
Cannes Film Festival
• 1 Nomination
