John Wayne is monumentally miscast as the captain of a German boat during World War 2. John Wayne pretty much plays the part as he plays all of his parts - simply as 'John Wayne'. He saunters through his role, not really acting but just being there; however, he does have a great screen presence. He's not a German, though, and his strong American accent does him no favours in the believability stakes, and the fact that all of the crew speak English make this a film that obviously doesn't care whether or not the audience will believe it. Of course, this is 1950's Hollywood, so we can't expect the crew speak German with subtitles or anything like that; but having a German crew speak fluent English doesn't really work.
Despite it's relative silliness, however, this film is decent throwaway entertainment. The plot follows the escapades of John Wayne...I mean Karl Ehrlich, a German freighter captain who must take his ship from Sydney, Australia to it's homeland of Germany. However, things are never that simple as hot on his heels are the British Navy, and as we all know; Britannia rules the waves, so John...I mean Karl has a job on his hands. A chase is always exciting to see in a film, and it is exciting here.... sometimes. The film never reaches the dizzy highs of other action adventure films, but it holds it's own in the entertainment department. There are several good sequences, such as a shark attack, several scenes of rough sea and a near mutiny among other things.
Lana Turner stars opposite John Wayne as the standard 'love interest'. Lana's performance isn't bad, and she looks nice; but the love part of the film seems very much like it was tacked on in order to get more people to go and see it. I know that this obviously isn't what happened, as all love interests in films like this are very much needed so that the story can progress and have nothing to do with getting more people into the cinema. Oh wait. Anyway, despite this needless element; The sea Chase is mostly well paced and it doesn't get boring often, and when it does it's not for long; so I recommend the film to anyone that just wants something mindless to watch for a couple of hours; like I did when I watched it.
