My Review of "Captain Courageous (1996)"

Captain Courageous is a movie that I have never heard of. Netflix has had a good batting average with me so I thought I'd check it out. What I experienced from this movie was nothing more than a cookie cutter low budget movie. There's elements of entertainment but for the most part it wasn't that great a ride.

The movie starts off in the early 1900s with this spoiled snot nosed kid named Harvey. He's this really rich orphan kid. His parents passed away when he was really young so there's really no one to properly teach him what's right and wrong. He does have a servant that tries to teach him some humility but he's just a servant. Harvey doesn't really listen to them because they're all subordinates.

After a really out of left field situation happens to Harvey, he finds himself stranded in the ocean. I have to say the situation that happened to him is pretty much ridiculous and almost laughable.

A fisherman crew saves him from freezing and drowning in the ocean. Instead of showing gratitude, Harvey orders them to sail to New York. Well I guess he did offer them money but they didn't believe that he is who he said he was.

The captain has none of it and gets his son Dan to brief Harvey of the ship rules. Basically what the captain says goes. Obviously Harvey isn't used to taking orders but he really has no choice in the matter.

After a brief period of time he caves and becomes one of the fisherman. the movie has a number of things that happen after that. I won't spoil it for you but they're all based on being morally good people.

This movie is really about how Harvey learns what family means and become a member of the family. He learns about the value of everyone's life. Everyone on the ship has an important role to play in keeping everyone alive. He starts to understand that he has value on the ship by contributing in physical work.

I guess Netflix suggested this to me because I've been watching a lot of movies based on the meaning of friendship and family. The movie goes in depth to describe each of the fishermen's relationship with each other.

Sadly the acting was a little uneven. There were a few awkward scenes where the acting is laughably bad and you can tell that they're trying their best to be serious. Then there's certain scenes that were done quite nicely. It is a pretty uneven movie.

It's also a pretty low budget movie. The special effects are pretty bad. You can pretty much guess how they did everything. There's a fire explosion that looks straight out of an amateur YouTube channel.

I also wonder if this is a made for TV movie because there was a certain scene that transitioned to black and then it transitioned back to the last 5 seconds of the last scene. It's as if the movie was supposed to go to commercial and then come back to the movie.

The most important part of the movie was that it was okay to watch. I wasn't totally bored with it but it is definitely not for everyone.If you're casually looking for something to watch. I would say steer clear of this movie. I got suckered into watching it.

Overall, I have to give this movie points for trying. It did a fairly okay job in creating an entertaining movie but ultimately it fell flat. There were a few questionable scenes that totally took me out of the movie. I have to give this movie a 5 out of 10. It's not horrible but I wouldn't recommend this to others to watch.