The Search for Paradise

Ever since the origins of cinema, movies have explored the elusive search for paradise, whether it’s on a desert island, a remote mountain hideaway or even in one’s own backyard. The Internet Movie Database lists no less than 330 movies depicting some aspect of the quest for a paradise.

The latest entry in the paradise oeuvre is “The Beach,” which opens Friday. Leonardo DiCaprio stars in this action drama about a young traveler who finds a map at his Bangkok hotel that supposedly leads to a mysterious island paradise. Later this year, Tom Hanks finds himself on an island in Robert Zemeckis’ “Cast Away.”

Below is a look at some of the films dealing with the themes of paradise lost and found. As this selection suggests, depicting paradise is often as elusive as finding paradise itself. (The ones with a * are available on video).

“Male and Female” (1919): Cecil B. DeMille directed this rollicking adaptation of James M. Barrie’s play “The Admirable Crichton,” starring a very young Gloria Swanson. The satire of class divisions deals with a group of snobby rich folk who are shipwrecked on a beautiful deserted island. Soon, the class barriers are broken down when the resourceful butler, Crichton, becomes the leader of the group.

“White Shadows in the South Seas” (1928): W.S. Van Dyke directed this drama starring Monte Blue as a once-respected physician now living on a Polynesian island. His peaceful existence is disturbed when a pearl trader (Robert Anderson) exploits the native population.

“Never the Twain Shall Meet” (1931): Leslie Howard stars in this creaky early talkie as a stuffy San Francisco ship owner who becomes the guardian of the South Sea island daughter, Tamea (Conchita Montengro), of the leprosy-stricken captain of one of his ships. Howard ends up going to live on the South Sea island with the sultry Tamea, but quickly learns that paradise isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be and becomes an abusive alcoholic.

* “Bird of Paradise” (1932): Soapy, silly but enjoyable melodrama starring Joel McCrea as a young man who falls overboard and is rescued by a beautiful Polynesian woman (Dolores Del Rio). The two quickly fall in love, only to have their happiness shattered when she is scheduled to be sacrificed to the gods when the island’s volcano erupts.

* “Mr. Robinson Crusoe” (1932): Although he was a bit too long in the tooth for an action role, 50-something Douglas Fairbanks Jr. turns on the charm in this updating of Daniel Defoe’s tale. Fairbanks bets that he can live life on a deserted island just like the fictional hero.

* “The Hurricane” (1937): John Ford directed this granddaddy of disaster films starring Jon Hall and Dorothy Lamour as island native lovers whose idyllic affair is put asunder by the isle’s evil new governor (Raymond Massey). To make matters worse, a huge hurricane threatens to destroy the island. Mary Astor and Thomas Mitchell also star.

* “Lost Horizon” (1937): Frank Capra directed the definitive adaptation of James Hilton’s romantic fantasy about Shangri-La, the Himalayan mountain paradise where no one grows old. However, certain death awaits those who try to return to civilization. Ronald Colman, Jane Wyatt, Margo and Edward Everett Horton are among the stars.

* “The Beachcomber” (1938): Charles Laughton and his wife, Elsa Lanchester, star in this delightful British comedy directed by Laughton’s producing partner, Erich Pommer. Laughton shines as a beach bum living on a beautiful island who is reformed by a missionary.

* “The Wizard of Oz” (1939): In this famed musical adaptation of the L. Frank Baum children’s story, Maugham story.

Dorothy (Judy Garland) pines for a place over the rainbow where she won’t get in any trouble. But she realizes after she lands in the magical world of Oz that her paradise is really her farm in Kansas.

* “The Enchanted Cottage” (1945): John Cromwell directed this delicate romantic fantasy about a lonely, plain woman (Dorothy McGuire) and shy disfigured man (Robert Young) who discover paradise in an enchanted cottage. Haunting.

“The Blue Lagoon” (1949): Jean Simmons and Donald Houston star in the original version of the fable about two young children who are shipwrecked on a deserted island, only to mature and fall in love.

Randal Kleiser directed the enormously popular but dopey 1980 remake starring Brooke Shields and Christopher Atkins as the beautiful young lovers.

“The Captain’s Paradise” (1953): In this splendid British comedy, Alec Guinness plays a sea captain who creates his own paradise by having wives (Celia Johnson and Yvonne DeCarlo) with wildly different personalities at two ports.

* “Forbidden Planet” (1956): This inventive sci-fi version of Shakespeare’s “The Tempest” finds scientist Walter Pidgeon living in a man-made paradise on a distant planet with his beautiful daughter (Anne Francis). But lurking on the planet is an evil, invisible monster.

* “Swiss Family Robinson” (1960): Walt Disney’s delectable version of the Johann Wyss novel about a family stranded alone on a ship after a storm at sea. After building a raft, they sail to a nearby island. The family loves its home away from civilization until pirates come after them. Dorothy McGuire, John Mills, Kevin Corcoran, James MacArthur and Tommy Kirk star.

* “Father Goose” (1964): Cary Grant sheds his sophisticated image to play a scruffy beach bum living a carefree life in the South Seas during World War II. After his friend (Trevor Howard) enlists his help to serve as a lookout for the Australian navy, Grant ends up saving a group of schoolgirls and their headmistress (Leslie Caron).

* “Paradise, Hawaiian Style” (1966): Elvis Presley swivels his hips in this musical romp in which he finds paradise in running a charter airline service and romancing beautiful women.

* “The Castaway Cowboy” (1974): James Garner heads the cast of this weak Disney comedy in which he plays a cowboy, shipwrecked in Hawaii who meets a beautiful woman (Vera Miles).

* “Paradise” (1982): A true Golden Turkey starring Willie Aames and Phoebe Cates, who spend the movie in various stages of undress. This “Blue Lagoon” rip-off finds them playing two young people who find love at a desert oasis.

* “Castaway” (1987): Nicolas Roeg directed this overblown adaptation of Lucy Irvine’s best-seller starring Oliver Reed as a middle-aged ruffian who advertises in a London paper for a young woman (Amanda Donahue) to spend a year with him on a desert island. Island life is not quite as idyllic as they had anticipated.