Return to Paradise ** (1953, Gary Cooper, Barry Jones, Roberta Haynes) – Classic Movie Review 7686

Director Mark Robson’s 1953 Return to Paradise stars Gary Cooper as Mr Morgan, a drifter sailor who lives in romantic bliss on the remote Pacific island of Matareva with island native Maeva (Roberta Haynes) in the 1920s. Morgan and Maeva enjoy a romance and then have a child.

But the dream life turns sour when Morgan clashes with the local priest missionary, puritanical Pastor Corbett (Barry Jones), and then his wife dies, prompting him to quit the island, leaving his young daughter behind.

At the start of World War Two, Morgan returns in search of his daughter to find she has fallen in love with an American pilot who has crash-landed on the island. Will history repeat itself?

Return to Paradise is an accomplished enough South Seas romantic adventure melodrama drawing its plot and theme from the short story Mr Morgan in the 1951 short story collection Return to Paradise by James A Michener, his sequel to Tales of the South Pacific.

Return to Paradise is a competent but under-powered and somehow none too inspiring vehicle for a rather tired seeming Cooper, which tugs at all the right heartstrings without stirring the blood. The far-away-from-it-all Samoan scenery, beautifully shot in Technicolor by Winton C Hoch on location in Matautu, Western Samoa (present-day Samoa), is a huge asset, and so is Dimitri Tiomkin’s score.

Also in the cast are Moira MacDonald [Moira Walker], John Hudson, Donald Ashford, Yerry Dunleavy, Henrietta Godinet, Kalapu, Hans Kruse, Mamea Matatumua, Kathleen Newick, Howard Paulsen, Herbert Ah Sue, Felice Va’a, Maylia and Ezra Williams.

Frances Gow, Brian McEwen and Web Overlander had their scenes deleted.

In 2003, the 50th anniversary of the shoot was celebrated on Upolu Island, Samoa, with Roberta Haynes, Donald Ashford, Terry Dunleavy, Moira MacDonald attending.

In 2015, Haynes said she adored working with Cooper, though he was ill and on medication during filming on location in British West Samoa.

Roberta Haynes died on 4 April 2019, aged 89. She was also known for Police Academy 6: City Under Siege (1989), Point Blank (1967) and Gun Fury (1953). She was born in Wichita Falls, Texas, but was often cast as Native American, Polynesian and Mexican women because of her dark hair, dark eyes and olive skin. When her Hollywood career fell away, she went to live in Paris and worked at the Cinecittà film studio in Rome, later returning to Los Angeles to work in TV as a vice president at Fox.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 7686

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