The Mysterious Island
by Jules Verneliterary work· published 1888
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This sequel to "20,000 Leagues Under The Sea" doesn't advertise itself as such. Most of the book concerns the efforts of a group of hot-air balloon castaways in the south Pacific ocean attempting to use modern knowledge in order to survive in near-desert-island conditions. "Robinson Crusoe" (Defoe, 1719) started a trend of survival tales that lasts in some respects to this day and "Island" (1874) is Verne's contribution to that body of work. In my estimate, no film so far has done this book justice.
Adaptations (5)
The Mysterious Island has been adapted 5 times, across film and television series, from 1916 to 2012. The most recent is Journey 2: The Mysterious Island (2012).
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea1916 · film · 105 min · dir. Stuart Paton · IMDb ↗IMDb6.1100%Captain Nemo has built a fantastic submarine for his mission of revenge. He has traveled over 20,000 leagues in search of Charles Denver - a man who caused the death of Princess Daaker. Seeing what he had done, Denver took the daughter to his yacht and sailed away.
The Mysterious Island1929 · film · 95 min · dir. Lucien Hubbard, Benjamin Christensen, Maurice Tourneur · IMDb ↗IMDb6.2On a volcanic island near the Kingdom of Hetvia rules Count Dakkar, a benevolent leader and scientist who has eliminated class distinction among the island's inhabitants. Dakkar, his sister Sonia and her fiance, engineer Nicolai Roget have designed a submarine which Roget pilots on its initial voyage just before the island is overrun by Baron Falon, despotic ruler of Hetvia. Falon sets out after Roget in a second submarine and the two craft, diving to the ocean's floor, discover a strange land populated by dragons, giant squid and an eerie undiscovered humanoid race.
Mysterious Island1951 · film · 252 min · dir. Spencer Gordon Bennet · IMDb ↗IMDb5.9It is 1865 and Union prisoners use a military balloon to escape a Southern prison camp near the end of the Civil War. The balloon drifts for days and finally lands on a mysterious volcanic island with very unusual inhabitants. Also landing, in a better aircraft, is Rulu, a visitor from Mercury. She seeks a radio-active material that will enable her to manufacture an explosive that will destroy the world or, at least, the portion known as Earth in this 15 Chapter Serial from the 1950s.
Mysterious Island1995 · television series · 85 min · IMDb ↗IMDb7.1Mysterious Island is a Canadian television series based on Jules Verne's novel L'Île mystérieuse. It ran for one season in 1995. The beginning of the series is much as in the novel. A group of refugees attempting to escape the American Civil War in a balloon wind up stranded on a remote Pacific island, where they are able to improvise a comfortable living for themselves while they wait for a passing ship. As time passes, they become suspicious that some unseen force is watching and directing their movements. The main difference between the protagonists of the series and those of the novel is the addition of a female character, the wife of Pencroft. The unseen watcher, Captain Nemo, is more active and less benevolent than in the novel. Able to monitor the island through steampunk-style closed-circuit television and other advanced devices, he treats the castaways as human laboratory specimens, influencing their environment to test their behaviour under stressful conditions. As the series progresses, his tests become more extreme as their continued co-operation threatens his preferred thesis that all humans are, at base, selfish and untrustworthy. In the series finale, Nemo apparently succeeds in breaking up the group; this proves to be a ruse by the protagonists, who are now certain of Nemo's existence. After they penetrate his hideaway, Nemo admits that the 'experiment' is ruined, and offers to return the castaways to civilisation in his submarine. In a final twist, he puts out to sea without them, apparently leaving them alone on the island, without his influence for good or ill.
Journey 2: The Mysterious Island2012 · film · 94 min · dir. Brad Peyton · IMDb ↗Sean Anderson partners with his mom's boyfriend on a mission to find his grandfather, who is thought to be missing on a mythical island.
