When I was a young man, I was swept away by the movie Mutiny on the Bounty. Not the Mel Gibson one – ew, no. Not the Clark Gable one – I mean, come on, I’m not THAT old.
No, no, it was Marlon Brando as Fletcher Christian and Trevor Howard as the salty Cap’n Bligh. Oh, a good pair those two made.
I tell you this in secret, because it’s kind of embarrassing: I spent the bulk of my days the summer that movie came out way up high in a neighborhood castor bean tree.
I climbed up as high as I could go, and the wind would blow, and the tree would rock, and the leaves would sigh like the open sea, and the sky was so blue, and I went a’sailin’ away towards romance and high adventure in the Great South Sea.
Stupid story. Sadly true.
Anyway, the book Fragile Paradise, written by Glynn Christian, a great, great grandson of Fletcher Christian, revealed that Fletcher Christian bellowed “I am in hell with you, sir!” at Captain Bligh.
“I am in HELL with you, sir!”
Mel Gibson kind of squeaks it out in his version of the story. Fortunately, Brando was spared the opportunity as the book was published after his version on Bounty debuted.
Why are we poring over all this old film rubbish and nonsense, you ask? Because we took my globetrotting daughter to LAX this morning, and drove not once, but twice through Malibu.
I know, Malibu, blah blah blah. But it IS beautiful, and the weather was epically gorgeous, and we spotted not one, but three container ships in the inside channel, laden deep and headed north. Three!
Not one was the converted collier Bethia, purchased by the Royal Navy, and renamed Bounty. But then again, neither seemed to be undergoing a mutiny. See? Never change a ship’s name!
So, our drive up the coast, from Santa Monica, beneath the rugged Pacific Palisades, through Malibu-Barbie Malibu, up into Ventura County, past the ginormous Mugu Rock, and around thorny Point Mugu felt an awful lot like driving alongside the Great South Sea.
Duh. Same ocean.
My book remains unread by that certain someone, the very love of my life, whilst her sister, the one who read it twice and said I had done an amazing job of creating a splendid fairytale, has yet to send me her notes.
Every day, when I get home from work, I rush to the mailbox because maybe today, today is the one. Nope. Just bills and junk mail.
I am in hell with you, sir! Or, well, madame…
John D Reinhart 