OK, a great way to start this quest. For years, In The Wake Of The Bounty was thought to be a 'lost film". Ostensibly the first film based on the HMS Bounty story, the film is a mix of travel documentary and story telling. The director, Australian Charles Chauvel, intended to make a series of travel docu-dramas. All told, only two were made, In The Wake Of The Bounty being the first. After the first 27 minutes of Bounty storytelling, the rest of the film (except for two flashback sceens with Flynn) are travelogue stuff from Chauvel's three months filming on Pitcairn Island.
Probably for a good reason only two were made. The staging, acting, and direction are, frankly, laughably bad. At times it looks as if someone was filming a high school play. Even by 1933 standards, Chauvel's film looks like an early silent movie, testament to the ancient equipment available to him at the time in Australia. Between that and the bare breasted Tahitian girls (this was, after all, pre-Code), the film is little more than a historical oddity. Not that there is anything wrong with historical oddities. Or bare breasted Tahitian girls.
But it is notable for being Errol Flynn's first film role. In the 60 minute film, he has about 3 - 4 minutes of screentime. His first words on film: "Enough. Come on. Water." Pretty amateurish stuff, but what's one to expect? He kind of fell into this whole acting thing at the time.
From Wikipedia:
In 1933 (Chauvel) made his first 'talkie': In the Wake of the Bounty starring Errol Flynn as Fletcher Christian (before Flynn went to Hollywood). The film mixed re-enactments with documentary, and focused not so much on the mutiny itself as on its consequences.To provide a long postscript to the story of the mutiny, the Chauvels went to Pitcairn Island and shot some very interesting footage of the Bounty descendants, spending three months on the island. He also included footage of bare-breasted Tahitian dancers which caused a temporary problem with the censor. The documentary parts were later edited out and used as promotional material for the 1935 Hollywood film about the mutiny.
Now, the entire movie can be seen online:
http://www.imdb.com/video/internet-archive/vi1570243097/
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