Rent Captains Courageous (1937)

Chico Marx at Sea - Captains Courageous review by griggs

There’s plenty to enjoy in this sea-sprayed slice of studio sincerity, even if it sometimes drifts when it should sail. Captains Courageous tells of a pampered brat who takes an unplanned dip and resurfaces as a better human being—thanks to a crew of saintly Massachusetts fishermen who seem to moonlight as moral philosophers. It’s part adventure, part sermon, and pure 1930s gloss.

Spencer Tracy is all heart as Manuel, the kindly fisherman with an accent that drifts somewhere between Lisbon and Little Italy. It’s less Portuguese, more “Chico Marx goes nautical.” Still, he and young Freddie Bartholomew keep the film afloat through sheer earnestness.

It’s a bit slow, a bit syrupy, and very much a product of its time, but there’s a strange sincerity beneath all that varnish. Captains Courageous means every word of its salty sermon—and somehow, that’s what keeps it from sinking.