MovieRob’s Birthday Bash of Favorites 2022 (#15 of 49) – Ship of Fools (1965) – Encore Review 2

January is my birthday month, so I decided that I would try and do something quite unique and special for this milestone in my life. I will be turning 48, so I decided to watch 49 (48+1 for good luck) of my all time favorite movies in a random order over the course of this month. I have reviewed every one of these films already, but I will now give new perspectives on them all. Every one of these films received a 10/10 scoring from me. Some of these reviews will contain spoilers so if you have never seen them before, I recommend that you read some of my previous reviews of the film that are spoiler free before reading on…

Hope you enjoy!

This is film #15 of the 49.

Let’s continue with…

“Do you think that bothers me? Besides, I like that little man; what kind of salesman do you think I would be if I couldn’t deal with a situation like that? A salesman is supposed to deal a difficult situation and overcome it. Listen, it’s not a new story: white men hate black men, Muslims hate Buddhists-that’s the way it goes. There’s prejudice everywhere. It does no good to give it back. You have got to use your noogin’. ” – Lowenthal

Initial Viewing Memories – This is a movie that I came across by accident 5 years ago while reviewing Best Picture nominees and was blown away by how much I enjoyed it.

Number of Times Seen – 3 Times (7 Dec 2016, 26 Sep 2019 and 10 Jan 2022)

Link to original review – Here and Here

Brief Synopsis – A group of passengers on a German ocean liner in the days before World War II deal with their country’s policies and how it affects the various persona aboard the ship.

My Take on it – This is a film that blew me away when I first saw it 5 years ago because of how profound it was.

The characters make up an iconoclast of so many different personalities and opinions prior to outbreak of World War II.

The way that this film carries so many minor stories is great and seems to be one of the reasons of how The Love Boat and numerous other TV shows followed suit years later.

The cast is superb and they manage to give us so many different personalities that help enrich the story and the sub-plots of each of them along the way.

The choice to use Michael Dunn as the narrator works really well in allowing the viewer to feel like they are getting a fly-on-the-wall view of everything that transpires here and it’s great how he constantly breaks the fourth wall when turning to the audience along the way.

The film does an excellent job showing how each of these characters seemingly lives in their own world and it would be amazing to see how each of them would look at things in retrospective years later after the war like the audience can.

Highly Highly Recommended!

MovieRob’s Favorite Trivia – Heinz Rühmann was not Jewish, but he was a fervent anti-Nazi and anxious to play the part. (From IMDB)

Rating – Oscar Worthy (10/10) (no change from original review)