The sole survivor of a lost whaling ship relates the tale of his captain's self-destructive obsession to hunt the white whale, Moby Dick.
This classic story by Herman Melville revolves around Captain Ahab and his obsession with a huge whale, Moby Dick. The whale caused the loss of Ahab's leg years before, leaving Ahab to stomp the boards of his ship on a peg leg. Ahab is so crazed by his desire to kill the whale, that he is prepared to sacrifice everything, including his life, the lives of his crew members, and even his ship to find and destroy his nemesis, Moby Dick.—E.W. DesMarais <[email protected]>
In 1841, young Ishmael signs up for service abroad the Pequod, a whaler sailing out of New Bedford. The ship is under the command of Captain Ahab, a strict disciplinarian who exhorts his men to find Moby Dick, the great white whale. Ahab lost his his leg to that creature and is desperate for revenge. As the crew soon learns, he will stop at nothing to gain satisfaction.—garykmcd
In 1841, a sailor named Ishmael (Richard Basehart) arrives in the New England town of New Bedford, Massachusetts to find work on a whaling ship. Due to a shortage of local lodgings, he is forced to share his room at the inn with a Pacific Islander and harpooner named Queequeg (Friedrich Von Ledebur), whom he befriends after a tense first meeting. Queequeg did not know that he was sharing his room with Ishmael and attacks him when he finds Ishmael in his bed. The owner of the Inn Peter Coffin (Joseph Tomelty) helps straighten the matter out.
Ishmael learns that as an outsider, he needs permission from the sailors of New Bedford to join a whaling crew. As the whaling rights belong to the natives of the town. Officers Stubb and Flask grant him the permission when Ishmael agrees to their rights over any profits from whaling.The town church is littered with epitaphs of crews and sailors lost to whale attacks over the years.
The next morning, the two of them join the crew of Pequod (They were attracted to the ship as it was adorned with all sorts of ivory, skulls and bones from whale hunting) under the command of Captain Ahab (Gregory Peck), who is obsessed with hunting and killing a legendary, white-skinned whale named Moby Dick, who was responsible for severing Ahab's left leg.Peleg (Mervyn Johns) questions Ishmael's desire to join a whaling ship as he was in the merchant service before and has never thrown a harpoon at a whale. Peleg offers Ishmael a 300th part of the profits when Bildad (Philip Stainton) wanted to offer him only a 777th part. Queequeg is offered 60th part of the profits due to his harpooning skills.The ship is loaded with supplies and readied for departure.
Just before their departure, Ishmael and Queequeg encounter a man named Elijah (Royal Dano), who delivers an ominous warning about Ahab and that all but one of the crew who follow him will find their deaths on this voyage. Elijah says that the whale marked Ahab's soul. He says that the crew will smell land where there is no land and that Ahab would fall, but then rise within the hour. And after that all but one crew will perish.Bildad and Peleg get off the ship before it sails.
The ship carries Carpenter (Noel Purcell), Pip the cabin boy (Tamba Allenby), Daggoo (Edric Connor), Tashtego (Tom Clegg) (harpooner) and Perth the blacksmith (Ted Howard).
As the ship casts off, and for some time afterwards, Ahab remains unseen until he finally appears to align his crew to the hunt for Moby Dick and sets course for the Bikini Atoll, where the whale is said to dwell. While the crew reaps a fair bounty of oil on their journey, Ahab's obsession with Moby Dick remains foremost in his mind.The crew learns that Moby Dick was the whale that took Ahab's leg. Ahab works the crew into a frenzy and makes them take an oath to hunt Moby Dick. The crew know that Moby Dick has killed over 1000 men so far, has a crooked jaw and has many harpoons stuck in its hump.
Whaling process requires boats with harpooners to be lowered into the water. The boats are rowed next to the whales, where harpoons are thrust into the whale and the boats are attached to the harpoons with rope. The boats then follow the whale and continue to harpoon it till it sprouts blood and dies. The carcass is recovered and brought aboard to strip off the meat and the whale oil. The bones are stripped and thrown back into the sea. The oil from one whale can power 1000 homes for a year.Ahab has studied the migration patterns of the whales by looking at old shipping charts and knows the exact location where he can find the whales. Yet, he first wants Moby Dick. Ahab says that he predicts to find Moby Dick at Bikini Atoll as per his study of the charts.
When the captain Boomer (James Robertson Justice) of a passing ship, who recently lost his hand to the white whale, informs Ahab of Moby Dick's latest whereabouts near the coast of Madagascar, Ahab immediately breaks off a particularly successful hunt, unsettling his crew, particularly his chief mate Starbuck (Leo Genn) (2nd in command).Starbuck argues that hunting a dumb brute that acted out of instinct is not wise. But Ahab is adamant that his ego is worth more to him.Starbuck asks his fellow officers Stubb (Harry Andrews) (2nd mate) and Flask (Seamus Kelly) (3rd mate) for help wresting command of the Pequod from Ahab, which the two refuse.
As the Pequod nears the atoll, a top-man falls from the ship's mast into the sea and disappears. Right afterwards, the Pequod is stuck in slack water for days. Casting bones to read his future, Queequeg foresees his death and orders the ship's carpenter to make him a coffin, before he sits down to await his demise.When one of the crew prepares to cut Queequeg's skin for fun, Ishmael rises to his friend's defense, prompting Queequeg to break his death reverie and defend Ishmael. Just then, Moby Dick briefly appears before the ship and escapes before the Pequod crew can pursue him.
After rowing the ship out of the becalmed area, Ahab resumes the hunt. To motivate the crew, Ahab offers his own 10% of the profits from the entire voyage to the crew if they kill Moby Dick.They encounter the Rachel, another whaler from New Bedford, whose captain, Gardiner (Francis De Wolff), asks Ahab to help search for his son, who was carried off by Moby Dick. Ahab refuses his aid and departs.When the Pequod hits a typhoon, Ahab uses the gale to speed the chase, endangering the ship. Starbuck attempts to kill Ahab in anger but relents when in a rare humane moment Ahab reminisces about his self-destructive obsession for revenge. The ship is stuck by St. Elmo's fire (a type of Northern lights effect), but Ahab douses it and continues hunting for Moby Dick.
Right after this conversation, a strange omen portends the fulfillment of Elijah's baleful prophecy (Ahab smells land in the middle of the ocean and the smell was coming from Moby Dick), which Ishmael recounts to Ahab. The captain seems affected but shakes off his doubts when Moby Dick reappears moments later.The Pequod crew sets out in their boats to bring him down. In the chaotic altercation, Moby Dick destroys Ahab's boat, but Ahab climbs onto the whale's back and stabs him until Moby Dick submerges, entangling Ahab in the harpoon lines on his back and drowning him.
Starbuck has a chance to abandon the hunt but chooses instead to avenge Ahab. Moby Dick attacks the boats, smashing them and killing the men; he then rams and sinks the Pequod before disappearing. Ishmael, the only survivor, manages to cling onto Queequeg's coffin until he is found and picked up by the Rachel.
