The Long Voyage Home

A group of merchant seamen endures the early days of World War II.

The Long Voyage Home is an entertaining melodrama, provided you can accept John Wayne as a Swede.

At the time, The Long Voyage Home was only John Wayne’s second credited pairing with director John Ford, after his breakout performance in Stagecoach, and though he has top billing, Wayne’s role is essentially a minor character in an ensemble story. Thus, it’s easy to see how audiences of 1940 probably had an easier time swallowing Wayne as a naïve, lumbering Swede—accent and all. Nowadays, it’s near impossible.

That said, the film is a nice little melodrama, featuring some excellent effects during the storm sequences, and great turns from Thomas Mitchell, Ian Hunter and Ward Bond.

Ford handles things nicely, establishing solid atmosphere and near-perfect pacing. The adaptation by Dudley Nichols, from Eugene O’Neill’s plays, does a great job of fleshing out the individual crewman, creating real personalities that share a kindred spirit, and that’s what really sells The Long Voyage Home. As these men drink, fight, and love, you realize they’re not matinée heroes, but simply flawed men doing the only job they know how to do.