Island in the Sun (film)

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Island in the Sun
Directed by	Robert Rossen
Produced by	Darryl F. Zanuck
Written by	Alfred Hayes Alec Waugh
Starring	James Mason Joan Fontaine Dorothy Dandridge Joan Collins Harry Belafonte
Music by	Malcolm Arnold
Cinematography	Freddie Young
Editing by	Reginald Beck
Distributed by	Twentieth Century Fox
Release date(s)	12 June 1957
Running time	119 mins
Country	United States
Language	English
IMDb profile

Island in the Sun is a 1957 film that stars an ensemble cast including James Mason, Joan Fontaine, Dorothy Dandridge, Joan Collins, Michael Rennie and Harry Belafonte. The cast includes also Diana Wynyard, Patricia Owens and Stephen Boyd. The film is about race relations and interracial romance set in the island of Santa Marta. Barbados and Grenada were selected as the sites for the movie based on the novel by Alec Waugh.

The film follows several characters both black and white. Maxwell Fleury (Mason) is a white plantation owner's son who suffers from an inferiority complex and makes rash decisions to prove his worth. He lives with his beautiful wife, Sylvia, who he is extremely jealous of her husband and his younger sister Jocelyn (Collins). Jocelyn is being courted by Evan Templeton (Boyd), a war hero visiting the Governor of the island, his father Lord Templeton. The film also follows David Boyeur (Belafonte), a young black man emerging as a powerful politician representing the common people and seen as a threat to the white ruling class. Mavis Norman (Fontaine), a women from the elite white class strikes up a romantic interest in Boyeur and much of the film explores the tension between these too. Finally, the film takes a look at the interracial romance between Margot Seaton (Dandridge), a black drug store clerk, and Denis Archer, aid to the Governor.

Other characters includeHilary Carson (Rennie) who Maxwell Fleury thinks is having an affair with his wife.Colonel Whittingham the head of police who investigates a murder central to the plot.A Journalist named Bradshaw.And finally Julian Fleury and his wife (Wynyard) who are both hiding secrets from their children.

The characters and their relationships with each other are all shown to be complex and the issues being addressed were rather taboo for 1957. Furthermore, the film can be enjoyed for the lush, beautiful scenery and unpredictable plot dynamics.