Frenchman's Creek (film)

Frenchman's Creek is a 1944 adventure film adaptation of Daphne du Maurier's 1941 novel of the same name, about an aristocratic English woman who falls in love with a French pirate. The film was released by Paramount Pictures and starred Joan Fontaine, Arturo de Córdova, Basil Rathbone, Cecil Kellaway, and Nigel Bruce. Filmed in Technicolor, it was directed by Mitchell Leisen. The musical score was by Victor Young, who incorporated the main theme of French composer Claude Debussy's Clair de Lune as the love theme for the film.

The film is a mostly faithful adaptation of the novel, taking place during the reign of Charles II in the mid-17th century, mostly in the Cornish region of England.

Fontaine was under contract to independent producer to David O. Selznick, who loaned out his contract players to other studios. In this case, Fontaine was loaned to Paramount for this lavish production. She later complained about her work with director Leisen and some of her costars. The film's budget of $3.6 million made it Paramount's most expensive production up to that time.

Cast members Rathbone and Bruce were known for appearing together as Holmes and Dr. Watson, respectively, in the Sherlock Holmes films by Universal Studios. Frenchman's Creek was their only on-screen collaboration besides the Holmes films.

The film was released as an on demand DVD August 28, 2014 (Amazon); and has been shown on American Movie Classics and Turner Classic Movies.

Plot
In the 17th century Cornwall and London a beautiful learned Lady of means, Dona St. Columb, had it all – wealth, nobility, children...and a loveless marriage. After years of being royally subjected to mistreatment, she retreats with her two children to a secluded manor overlooking Britain's Atlantic shoreline. Once there, she is enthralled with the tall tales of a scoundrel of a pirate, who has been plundering nearby coastal villages. Full of adventure and fueled by years of neglect, she sets forth to seek him out, and it is not long before she finds him to be an irresistible gentleman. She is soon swept into his arms, and out onto a seaborne adventure where she chances death to protect her children from a vengeful father, who is out to reclaim what he had never known and to destroy something he had never shown – love.

Cast

 * Joan Fontaine as Dona St. Columb
 * Arturo de Córdova as Jean Benoit Aubrey
 * Basil Rathbone as Lord Rockingham
 * Nigel Bruce as Lord Godolphin
 * Cecil Kellaway as William
 * Ralph Forbes as Harry St. Columb
 * Harald Ramond as Edmond
 * Billy Daniels as Pierre Blanc
 * Moyna Macgill as Lady Godolphin
 * Patricia Barker as Henrietta
 * David James as James
 * Charles Coleman as Thomas (uncredited)
 * James Dime as Pirate (uncredited)
 * Al Ferguson as Guard (uncredited)

Reception
Bosley Crowther of The New York Times called the film "somewhat slow in starting", but observed that the production values were suitably extravagant and invited readers to "catch a post-chaise to the Rivoli and check your think-cap at the door if you want a two-hour excursion in fancy-pants cloak-and-sword escape." Variety agreed that the production values were "ultra", but found that the script "at times borders on the ludicrous". Harrison's Reports called it "A good costume entertainment" with "a fair quota of thrills ... It does, however, have many slow spots, and some judicious cutting would help matters considerably." John Lardner of The New Yorker wrote: "Not having read the Daphne du Maurier novel called Frenchman's Creek, I am powerless to say how it compares with the picture of the same name. My guess, like any gallant fellow's, would be that it compares favorably."

Awards
The film won an Academy Award for Best Art Direction (Hans Dreier, Ernst Fegté, Samuel M. Comer).