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''Run Silent, Run Deep'' is a 1958 American
black-and-white Black-and-white (B&W or B/W) images combine black and white to produce a range of achromatic brightnesses of grey. It is also known as greyscale in technical settings. Media The history of various visual media began with black and white, ...
war film War film is a film genre concerned with warfare, typically about navy, naval, air force, air, or army, land battles, with combat scenes central to the drama. It has been strongly associated with the 20th century. The fateful nature of battle s ...
starring
Clark Gable William Clark Gable (February 1, 1901November 16, 1960) was an American actor often referred to as the "King of Cinema of the United States, Hollywood". He appeared in more than 60 Film, motion pictures across a variety of Film genre, genres dur ...
and
Burt Lancaster Burton Stephen Lancaster (November 2, 1913 – October 20, 1994) was an American actor. Initially known for playing tough characters with tender hearts, he went on to achieve success with more complex and challenging roles over a 45-year caree ...
, based on the 1955 novel of the same name by Commander (later Captain) Edward L. Beach Jr. The picture was directed by
Robert Wise Robert Earl Wise (September 10, 1914 – September 14, 2005) was an American filmmaker. He won the Academy Awards for Best Director and Best Picture for his musical films ''West Side Story'' (1961) and ''The Sound of Music'' (1965). He was als ...
and produced by
Harold Hecht Harold Adolphe Hecht (June 1, 1907 – May 26, 1985) was an American film producer, dance director and talent agent. He was also, though less noted for, a literary agent, a theatrical producer, a theatre director and a Broadway actor. He was ...
. The title refers to "
silent running ''Silent Running'' is a 1972 American ecological-themed science fiction film. It is the directorial debut of Douglas Trumbull, and stars Bruce Dern, Cliff Potts, Ron Rifkin, and Jesse Vint. Plot In the future, all forests on Earth have b ...
", a
submarine A submarine (often shortened to sub) is a watercraft capable of independent operation underwater. (It differs from a submersible, which has more limited underwater capability.) The term "submarine" is also sometimes used historically or infor ...
stealth tactic. The story describes
World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
submarine warfare in the
Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is ...
, and deals with themes of vengeance, endurance, courage, loyalty, and honor, and how these can be tested during wartime. In addition to Gable and Lancaster playing the leads, the film also features
Jack Warden Jack Warden (born John Warden Lebzelter Jr.; September 18, 1920July 19, 2006) was an American actor who worked in film and television. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for ''Shampoo (film), Shampoo'' (1975) and '' ...
, and was the film debut of
Don Rickles Donald Jay Rickles (May 8, 1926 – April 6, 2017) was an American stand-up comedian and actor. He was known primarily for his insult comedy. His film roles include ''Run Silent, Run Deep (film), Run Silent, Run Deep'' (1958), ''Enter Laughing ...
.
United Artists United Artists (UA) is an American film production and film distribution, distribution company owned by Amazon MGM Studios. In its original operating period, it was founded in February 1919 by Charlie Chaplin, D. W. Griffith, Mary Pickford an ...
promoted ''Run Silent, Run Deep'' as a combination of the obsessiveness of ''
Moby-Dick ''Moby-Dick; or, The Whale'' is an 1851 Epic (genre), epic novel by American writer Herman Melville. The book is centered on the sailor Ishmael (Moby-Dick), Ishmael's narrative of the maniacal quest of Captain Ahab, Ahab, captain of the whaler ...
s Captain Ahab and the shipboard rivalry found in ''
Mutiny on the Bounty The mutiny on the ''Bounty'' occurred in the South Pacific Ocean on 28 April 1789. Disaffected crewmen, led by acting-Lieutenant Fletcher Christian, seized control of the ship, , from their captain, Lieutenant (navy), Lieutenant William Bli ...
''. Although based on a novel of the same name, and having many of the same characters, the plot of the film diverges from that of the book. Captain Beach, the author of the book, did not think highly of the film; he later said that the film company bought only the book title and was not interested in producing an accurate depiction of the theme and plot of his novel. Considering the star names involved, the film's box-office reception was disappointing.


Plot

A World War II
US Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the naval warfare, maritime military branch, service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is the world's most powerful navy with the largest Displacement (ship), displacement, at 4.5 millio ...
submarine A submarine (often shortened to sub) is a watercraft capable of independent operation underwater. (It differs from a submersible, which has more limited underwater capability.) The term "submarine" is also sometimes used historically or infor ...
officer,
Commander Commander (commonly abbreviated as Cmdr.) is a common naval officer rank as well as a job title in many army, armies. Commander is also used as a rank or title in other formal organizations, including several police forces. In several countri ...
P.J. Richardson, is determined to get revenge on the Japanese
destroyer In naval terminology, a destroyer is a fast, maneuverable, long-endurance warship intended to escort larger vessels in a fleet, convoy, or carrier battle group and defend them against a wide range of general threats. They were conceived i ...
''Akikaze'' and its captain, nicknamed "Bungo Pete", who has sunk four U.S. submarines in the Bungo Straits, including his previous command. He persuades the Navy Board to give him a new submarine command with the provision that his
executive officer An executive officer is a person who is principally responsible for leading all or part of an organization, although the exact nature of the role varies depending on the organization. In many militaries and police forces, an executive officer ...
be someone who has just returned from active sea patrol. He single-mindedly trains the crew of his new boat, the USS ''Nerka'', to return to the Bungo Straits and sink Bungo Pete, in spite of the Navy having expressly forbidden him from entering the Bungo Straits on this mission. Richardson's executive officer, Lieutenant Jim Bledsoe resents Richardson and the Navy leadership for denying him command of the ''Nerka'', and worries about the safety of his boat and his crew. Richardson rigorously drills the crew on a rapid bow shot. Firing at the bow of an approaching ship is considered an act of desperation due to a vessel's extremely narrow profile. He bypasses one target, then takes on a Japanese destroyer with a bow shot. The crew figures out that Richardson is avoiding legitimate targets to enter the Bungo Straits undetected in direct violation of his mission orders. They encounter a large Japanese convoy. After blowing up a cargo ship and engaging Bungo Pete, they are attacked by aircraft that had clearly been alerted to their presence and were waiting in ambush. They rapidly dive and barely survive
depth charge A depth charge is an anti-submarine warfare (ASW) weapon designed to destroy submarine A submarine (often shortened to sub) is a watercraft capable of independent operation underwater. (It differs from a submersible, which has more limited ...
s. Three of the crew are killed, and Richardson suffers an incapacitating concussion. The submarine narrowly dodges what the crew mistakenly believes is one of their own torpedoes doubling back on them. By sending up blankets, equipment, and the bodies of the dead, they convince the Japanese that the submarine has been sunk. Bledsoe uses Richardson's injury to assume command and set course for Pearl Harbor. While listening to
Tokyo Rose Tokyo Rose (alternative spelling Tokio Rose) was a name given by Allied troops in the South Pacific during World War II to all female English-speaking radio broadcasters of Japanese propaganda. The programs were broadcast in the South Pacific ...
proclaiming the sinking of their boat, several crewmen are mystified about how the Japanese are able to identify several of them by name. Bledsoe realizes that the Japanese have analyzed their floating trash. Since the Japanese believe the ''Nerka'' has been sunk, he returns to the Bungo Straits to fight the ''Akikaze'', which the submarine sinks with a bow shot, only to be attacked again by a mystery torpedo. Richardson deduces that the ''Akikaze'' was not working alone to sink US submarines, but was in concert with a Japanese submarine. He orders the boat into a dive just seconds before a Japanese torpedo races by. After a brief underwater standoff, Bledsoe realizes that with the ''Akikaze'' gone, the Japanese sub must defend its convoy. By attacking the convoy, the ''Nerka'' forces its adversary to surface, where it uses the shallow-draft decoy ship as a screen. The ''Nerka'' fires torpedoes under the shallow-draft ship, destroying the Japanese sub hiding behind it. Richardson collapses on the bridge, dies, and is buried at sea.


Differences with the novel

The film draws many plot elements from the novel, including Japanese gathering intelligence from the submarine's trash. One key difference is that the novel places Richardson ashore recovering from a battle injury and working on the torpedo exploder problem when Bledsoe takes out Richardson's boat and dies in the sinking of the USS ''Walrus''. In the novel, the conflict between Richardson and Bledsoe begins at the start of the war, while they are reconditioning the old in the
Naval Submarine Base New London Naval Submarine Base New London is the primary United States Navy East Coast submarine base, also known as the "Home of the Submarine Force." It is located in Groton, Connecticut directly across the Thames River from its namesake city of New L ...
and Richardson is compelled to disqualify Bledsoe for command of his own sub. The mutinous attitudes of the crew are an extension of Bledsoe's earlier rebelliousness, while the film provides them with no comparable context other than their loyalty to and respect for Bledsoe. Ensign Keith Leone, a sympathetic and loyal major character of the novel, is replaced by an unsympathetic and disloyal one who did not appear in the novel, Cartwright, to advance the conflict. At Gable's insistence, the film has Richardson taken seriously ill before being relieved of command, so Gable would not be perceived as playing a less-than-dominant character. In the film, the submarine does not ram Japanese lifeboats to ensure that Bungo Pete is killed. The US Navy, which helped with the film's production, may have been concerned with reviving memories of a 1943 incident in which Dudley W. Morton fired on Japanese shipwreck survivors while commanding .


Cast

*
Clark Gable William Clark Gable (February 1, 1901November 16, 1960) was an American actor often referred to as the "King of Cinema of the United States, Hollywood". He appeared in more than 60 Film, motion pictures across a variety of Film genre, genres dur ...
as Commander P.J. "Rich" Richardson *
Burt Lancaster Burton Stephen Lancaster (November 2, 1913 – October 20, 1994) was an American actor. Initially known for playing tough characters with tender hearts, he went on to achieve success with more complex and challenging roles over a 45-year caree ...
as Lieutenant Jim Bledsoe *
Jack Warden Jack Warden (born John Warden Lebzelter Jr.; September 18, 1920July 19, 2006) was an American actor who worked in film and television. He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for ''Shampoo (film), Shampoo'' (1975) and '' ...
as Yeoman 1st Class "Kraut" Mueller *
Brad Dexter Brad Dexter (born Boris Michel Soso; April 9, 1917 – December 12, 2002) was an American actor and film producer. He is known for tough-guy and western roles, including the 1960 film '' The Magnificent Seven'' (1960), and producing several fi ...
as Ensign Gerald Cartwright *
Don Rickles Donald Jay Rickles (May 8, 1926 – April 6, 2017) was an American stand-up comedian and actor. He was known primarily for his insult comedy. His film roles include ''Run Silent, Run Deep (film), Run Silent, Run Deep'' (1958), ''Enter Laughing ...
as Quartermaster 1st Class Ruby * Nick Cravat as Russo * Joe Maross as Chief Petty Officer Kohler * Mary LaRoche as Laura Richardson * Eddie Foy III as Larto * Rudy Bond as Sonarman 1st Class Cullen * John Gibson as Capt. Blunt


Production

The USS ''Redfish'' was used in many of the exterior scenes. This submarine had earlier portrayed the ''Nautilus'' in the Walt Disney film
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea ''Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas'' () is a science fiction adventure novel by the French writer Jules Verne. It is considered a classic within its genres and world literature. It was originally serialised from March 1869 to June 1870 i ...
(1954) and made several appearances in the television series ''The Silent Service''. She was scrapped in 1969. Rear Admiral Rob Roy McGregor, who had commanded two fleet boats (''
Grouper Groupers are a diverse group of marine ray-finned fish in the family Epinephelidae, in the order Perciformes. Groupers were long considered a subfamily of the seabasses in Serranidae, but are now treated as distinct. Not all members of this f ...
'' and '' Sea Cat'') during World War II, acted as the technical advisor. The actual Japanese destroyer '' Akikaze'' was lost with all hands while shielding the Japanese carrier ''Junyo'' from torpedoes launched by the submarine USS ''Pintado'' (SS-387) on November 1, 1944. She was stricken from the Navy list on January 10, 1945. The real USS ''Nerka'' (SS-380) was under construction during World War II, but construction was cancelled in July 1944. Nick Cravat, who starred with Lancaster in nine films, had a speaking part. This was rare for him because his thick
Brooklyn Brooklyn is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City located at the westernmost end of Long Island in the New York (state), State of New York. Formerly an independent city, the borough is coextensive with Kings County, one of twelv ...
accent did not fit the historical dramas in which he often appeared.
Don Rickles Donald Jay Rickles (May 8, 1926 – April 6, 2017) was an American stand-up comedian and actor. He was known primarily for his insult comedy. His film roles include ''Run Silent, Run Deep (film), Run Silent, Run Deep'' (1958), ''Enter Laughing ...
made his film debut in a small role, and in his 2007 memoirs, he recalled that during filming, Gable sometimes frustrated the filmmakers (including Lancaster, who was a financial investor in the film) by adhering to a strict 9-to-5 approach to the workday — he reportedly stopped working during the filming of major scenes. Later in his life, Lancaster publicly had nothing but praise and admiration for Gable, whom he described as a consummate professional. The film contains several accurate depictions of torpedo attacks being arranged with periscope sightings,
range Range may refer to: Geography * Range (geographic), a chain of hills or mountains; a somewhat linear, complex mountainous or hilly area (cordillera, sierra) ** Mountain range, a group of mountains bordered by lowlands * Range, a term used to i ...
and bearing calculations, and use of a
torpedo data computer The Torpedo Data Computer (TDC) was an early electromechanical analog computer used for torpedo fire-control on American submarines during World War II. Britain, Germany, and Japan also developed automated torpedo fire control equipment, but ...
to achieve a shooting solution. On the surface, the captain uses a target bearing transmitter mounted on the
bridge A bridge is a structure built to Span (engineering), span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or railway) without blocking the path underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, whi ...
to acquire a target visually and mark its bearing input for the shooting party inside the
conning tower A conning tower is a raised platform on a ship or submarine, often armoured, from which an officer in charge can conn (nautical), conn (conduct or control) the vessel, controlling movements of the ship by giving orders to those responsible for t ...
. This depicted the preferred tactic of night surface attack, taking advantage of both the submarine's greater speed and maneuverability using its
diesel engine The diesel engine, named after the German engineer Rudolf Diesel, is an internal combustion engine in which Combustion, ignition of diesel fuel is caused by the elevated temperature of the air in the cylinder due to Mechanics, mechanical Compr ...
s, and the use of its SJ radar in making accurate range and bearing calculations, although with greater risk of being sunk by bombs and shell fire. Director
Robert Wise Robert Earl Wise (September 10, 1914 – September 14, 2005) was an American filmmaker. He won the Academy Awards for Best Director and Best Picture for his musical films ''West Side Story'' (1961) and ''The Sound of Music'' (1965). He was als ...
had real submariners working with the cast until they could realistically depict the complexities of these torpedo attacks. Submarine veterans of World War II who viewed the film remarked on the accuracy of these scenes and the scenes now provide modern-day audiences with a view of what life was like aboard World War II submarines. The special effects were completed using miniatures, considered to be state-of-the-art in 1957, when the film was made. The US Navy and the production company staged a premiere for several journalists onboard the USS ''Perch'', while she was "seven miles off Long Beach and 60 feet down".


Reception

Bosley Crowther Francis Bosley Crowther Jr. (July 13, 1905 – March 7, 1981) was an American journalist, writer, and film critic for ''The New York Times'' for 27 years. His work helped shape the careers of many actors, directors and screenwriters, though some ...
, writing in ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'', called ''Run Silent, Run Deep'' "a straight tale of undersea adventure, all-male and all-submarine ...
hat A hat is a Headgear, head covering which is worn for various reasons, including protection against weather conditions, ceremonial reasons such as university graduation, religious reasons, safety, or as a fashion accessory. Hats which incorpor ...
has the hard, cold ring of truth", with "dangerous adventures
hat A hat is a Headgear, head covering which is worn for various reasons, including protection against weather conditions, ceremonial reasons such as university graduation, religious reasons, safety, or as a fashion accessory. Hats which incorpor ...
are severely, nail-bitingly tense" until "the ultimate showdown ... that keeps one forward on the chair." To the extent that the events depicted might appear hard to believe, he cited the credentials of the novel's author and noted, "they look more like the real thing in good old black-and-white." One critic later summarized the plot after it had been replicated in other submarine films: In its opening week, the film finished third at the US box office.


Legacy

The 2023
Netflix Netflix is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service. The service primarily distributes original and acquired films and television shows from various genres, and it is available internationally in multiple lang ...
series '' Gamera Rebirth'' has the third episode titled ''Run Silent, Run Deep'' as an homage to the Wise's film. In the Twin Peaks revival, the character Nadine opens a store to sell silent drape runners named Run Silent Run Drapes.


References


External links

* * * {{Authority control 1950s English-language films 1958 war films 1958 films American black-and-white films American films about revenge American war films Films about the United States Navy in World War II Films based on American novels Films based on military novels Films directed by Robert Wise Films produced by Burt Lancaster Films produced by Harold Hecht Films produced by James Hill Films scored by Franz Waxman Films with screenplays by John Gay (screenwriter) Norma Productions films Pacific War films United Artists films World War II submarine films 1950s American films English-language war films