Sinners in Paradise

1938 film by James Whale
  • May 19, 1938 (1938-05-19) (United States)
Running time
65 minutesCountryUnited StatesLanguageEnglishBudget$273,670[1]

Sinners in Paradise is a 1938 American south seas adventure film directed by James Whale and starring Madge Evans, John Boles, Bruce Cabot, Marion Martin and Gene Lockhart. In 1966, the film entered the public domain in the United States because the claimants did not renew its copyright registration in the 28th year after publication.[2]

Plot

A passenger aircraft crashes in mid-Pacific and some of the survivors reach an island inhabited only by an American, Jim Taylor, with his Chinese servant, Ping. He declines to help them, telling them to build their own shelter and gather their own food and, though he has a boat and fuel, refusing to take them off. The reason why he wants to remain undisturbed, we learn, is that he is wanted for murder. In time his attitude to the intruders softens as they, despite endless bickering, manage to form a working community and he finds himself increasingly drawn to an attractive young nurse, Anne Wesson, who is running away from her husband. When the boat is prepared for a trip to civilization, two crooked businessmen from the party steal it with Ping on board. In a fight, he kills them both and, fatally wounded, brings the boat back. The rest can then escape.

Cast

  • Madge Evans as Anne Wesson
  • John Boles as Jim Taylor
  • Bruce Cabot as Robert Malone aka The Torpedo
  • Marion Martin as Iris Compton
  • Gene Lockhart as Sen. Corey
  • Charlotte Wynters as Thelma Chase
  • Nana Bryant as Mrs. Franklin Sydney
  • Milburn Stone as Honeyman
  • Don 'Red' Barry as Jessup (as Donald Barry)
  • Morgan Conway as Harrison Brand
  • Willie Fung as Ping

See also

References

  1. ^ Dick, Bernard K. (2015). City of Dreams: The Making and Remaking of Universal Pictures. University Press of Kentucky. p. 116. ISBN 9780813158891.
  2. ^ Pierce, David (June 2007). "Forgotten Faces: Why Some of Our Cinema Heritage Is Part of the Public Domain". Film History: An International Journal. 19 (2): 125–43. doi:10.2979/FIL.2007.19.2.125. ISSN 0892-2160. JSTOR 25165419. OCLC 15122313. S2CID 191633078.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Sinners in Paradise.
  • Sinners in Paradise on YouTube
  • Sinners in Paradise at IMDb Edit this at Wikidata
  • Sinners in Paradise is available for free viewing and download at the Internet Archive
  • Southseascinema.org
  • v
  • t
  • e
Films directed by James Whale


Stub icon

This 1930s drama film-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.

  • v
  • t
  • e