Mara Maru

1952 "Tropical Treasure! Typhoon and Temptation!"
6| 1h38m| NR| en
Details

An American salvage diver plunges into dangerous intrigue around a sunken treasure in the Philippines.

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Reviews

Solemplex To me, this movie is perfection.
AutCuddly Great movie! If you want to be entertained and have a few good laughs, see this movie. The music is also very good,
Senteur As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.
Jakoba True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.
zardoz-13 Errol Flynn dives for sunken treasure in "Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye" director Gordon Douglas' "Mara Maru," with Ruth Roman, Raymond Burr, and Paul Picerni. This black & white yarn about avarice on high seas is predictable fare, but a top-notch cast, Gordon Douglas' assured direction, and some good underwater diving scene keep it afloat. Like the character that he plays, Errol Flynn was on his way down by the time that he cast in this adequate potboiler. Director Gordon Douglas doesn't let the action get water-logged for a moment, and "Mara Maru" is an entertaining epic even though it doesn't have any major surprises in it. Raymond Burr is perfectly cast as a villain with smooth edges who displays no qualms about cheating his partners as they set out to find a jewel encrusted cross. Picerni is just as oily as another villain who has a difficult time deciding whose side—either Burr or Flynn—that he wants to support. Virile Richard Webb gives a good account of himself as Flynn's former partner who winds up murdered before the first 30 minutes elapses. Another familiar face in this sturdy saga is Dan Seymour who plays a local cop in Manilla who wants to pin a murder on the intractable Flynn. Flynn fans will have a ball with this one. Of course, a capable stunt man probably wore the helmet and suit for the deep sea diving scenes, but Douglas does a good job of inserting close-ups of Flynn in the helmet into the action.
calvinnme Sometimes I like a film and I'll even have a hard time really being able to explain why.One example is this 1952 programmer from Warner Brothers. It was clearly a come down for star Errol Flynn who was being shoved off by the studio into a bit of a cheapie black and white production as a fulfillment of their contract with him. It would be, in fact, Flynn's last studio made film on his Warners contract.While there are no particular surprises in the story line of this tale about sunken treasure, it is smoothly and efficiently directed by Gordon Douglas, who seemed to get saddled with a lot of the films with lesser scripts. Make it work, Gordon, they seemed to say and he did. The Curtiz and Walsh rejects seemed to go to Douglas.Ruth Roman is Errol's leading lady this time out. No real sparks between them. Raymond Burr in his early heavy days (heavy as in villain, as well as weight) is the two faced opponent whose duplicity is pretty obvious right from his first appearance in the film.Flynn goes through the motions in his role for the most part but even when Errol isn't really trying, his understated performances still tend to satisfy me. Then, suddenly as the film approaches the end, Flynn starts to do some real acting. It happens in a scene in which he angrily slaps his Filipino assistant across the face and then shows remorse for his behaviour. It reminded me once again of what a good actor he could be when he put his mind to it. Recommended for watching talent in front of and behind the camera wrestle with and prevail with a so-so story.
armigerous-1 I don't know if this is true or not,but I am told that when this movie came out, the distributors took it to Tokyo to show, because by that time there was a fairly large demand for American movies in Japan...particularly action movies, and even more so those which featured well known stars like Errol Flynn, and were confident that it would be well received and quite profitable...but that even though the movie was given wide advertising and multiple screens all over Japan,nobody came to see it due to the fact that "Mara Maru" translates into Japanese as "Sh*t Boat"....and who in their right mind would want to see a movie with the title "Sh*t Boat"??
elliot-1 [Contains some minor spoilers about first 30 minutes of movie]Mara Maru, one of Errol Flynn's more mediocre movies, is obviously an attempt to cash in on the success of the B movies of the time, what we now call film noir, while attempting to add a twist of the usual Flynn style (i.e. a swashbuckler). The early part of the movie is almost an exact copy of the opening of The Maltese Falcon - the main character (in this case Flynn's) partner is murdered, he meets with hostile police, a past love affair with partner's wife is revealed, and then he meets with various mysterious villains who offer to help him towards large bundles of cash, if only he will acquire something for them.The mix isn't successful, with the noir element dominating most of the time, although the adventure quotient ups a bit later on. The problem with this is that Errol Flynn is great at being the charming rogue, but really not very convincing as the threatening Bogie-noir "man with a dark past" type. Indeed, no one is very convincing in this movie, most of the actors seeming like "Will work for food" types; moreover the plot proceeds much too slowly and ploddingly, and occasionally lapses into sentimentally, which has no place even in pseudo-noir. There are none of the directorial touches usually associated with noir movies either.Mara Maru is not an awful movie, merely boring and a waste of time; there are thousands upon thousands of movies your time would be better spent watching than this one. I'd recommend instead checking out either some of Flynn's much superior full-blown swashbucklers like The Sea Hawk, The Adventures of Don Juan, or The Adventures of Robin Hood; or some full-blown noirs, like The Maltese Falcon or Touch of Evil.