In the Pacific Ocean, a yacht wrecks on the reef just off a small island. The only survivor, Bob Rainsford (Joel McCrea), swims ashore and discovers a castle-like fortress. Inside, he meets the bizarre Count Zaroff (Leslie Banks), who introduces him to his two guests, Martin (Robert Armstrong) and Eve (Fay Wray), a brother and sister, who, coincidentally, have also been shipwrecked.
Zaroff recognizes Bob as a well-known big game hunter. He’s read all of his books on hunting and claims to be an avid hunter himself. In fact, he’s grown bored of traveling the world to hunt game like jaguars and tigers. He claims to have discovered a new animal to hunt and he’s stocked his island with them. Zaroff never reveals what the animal might before Martin drunkenly asks him to play the piano.
As Martin distracts Zaroff, Eve takes Bob aside to tell him that she’s worried because there were four survivors of their wreck. The other two crew members have disappeared in the week that they’ve been on the island. Zaroff claims they’ve gone out into the island’s jungle to hunt but Eve is afraid something sinister has happened to them.
That night, as Eve and Bob go upstairs to their rooms for the night, Zaroff invites Martin to visit his trophy room. In the middle of the night, Eve visits Bob’s room to ask his help. Martin has never come upstairs to bed. They immediately go to the trophy room and discover Zaroff’s secret just as Zaroff discovers their intrusion. Of course, I’m not really spoiling anything when I say that Zaroff’s “animals” are people and his trophy room is stocked with human heads.
With his strange accent, scarred face, and slicked-back hair, Leslie Banks, as Zaroff, looks exactly like a crazed villain. There’s no subtlety to his performance. Zaroff is a crazed villain and Banks plays it to the hilt. In case it wasn’t obvious enough, his wide-eyed stare is punctuated by Max Steiner’s melodramatic score.
Unfortunately, Joel McCrea’s performance as Bob isn’t as deliciously over-the-top as Banks’. He’s the good guy and he sticks to the formulaic 1930’s “man’s man” persona. Fay Wray plays a standard issue damsel-in-distress. Robert Armstrong is a hoot as the drunken Martin.
Viewed through the eyes of a modern moviegoer, The Most Dangerous Game will seem overly simple. The characters are one-dimensional and the plot is extremely basic. Even the action scenes are uncomplicated by anything other than the bare necessities. Yet, despite its limitations, it still manages to be quite fun. Even more so, once you recognize its influence on later adventure movies.
Clocking in at just over an hour, it takes just a bit more time than an episode of your favorite weekly drama series and likely provides twice as much entertainment. Well worth a viewing.
4.0 out of 5.0 stars
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