| Three Came Home | |
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Original poster |
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| Directed by | Jean Negulesco |
| Produced by | Nunnally Johnson |
| Written by | Nunnally Johnson (Agnes Newton Keith, autobiography) |
| Starring | Claudette Colbert Patric Knowles Florence Desmond Sessue Hayakawa |
| Music by | Hugo Friedhofer |
| Cinematography | William H. Daniels Milton R. Krasner |
| Editing by | Dorothy Spencer |
| Distributed by | Twentieth Century-Fox |
| Release date(s) | 20 February 1950 |
| Running time | 106 min. |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
Three Came Home (1950) is a post-war film made by Twentieth Century-Fox, based on the memoirs of the same name by writer Agnes Newton Keith. It depicts Keith's life in North Borneo in the period immediately before the Japanese invasion in 1942, and her subsequent internment and suffering, separated from her husband Harry, and with a young son to care for. Keith was initially interned at Berhala Island near Sandakan, North Borneo (today's Sabah) but spent most of her captivity at Batu Lintang camp at Kuching, Sarawak. The camp was liberated in September, 1945.
Adapted and produced by Nunnally Johnson, directed by Jean Negulesco, the film starred Claudette Colbert in the lead role. The New York Times reviewer said, "It will shock you, disturb you, tear your heart out. But it will fill you fully with a great respect for a heroic soul."
The film is now in the public domain and so is available to watch in its entirety online at no charge.[1][2][3][4][5]
A second unit filmed locations in Borneo for four weeks.[6]
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American-born Agnes Keith (Colbert) and her British husband (Patric Knowles) live a cushioned colonial life in North Borneo with their young son in 1942. After the Japanese invasion, they are interned and then taken to separate prison camps, one for men, the other for women and children. Amid the brutality of the internment camp, the camp commander Lieutenant-Colonel Suga (Sessue Hayakawa) is respectful to Mrs Keith because he is familiar with her work, and is shown to be kind to the children even when his own family has died in Hiroshima.
In August 1976, Leslie Halliwell described the film as "[w]ell-made, harrowing", assigning it ** (2 stars out of 4), a rarely-granted high rating.[7]
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