The Hawaiians

Drawn from the same source material as the George Roy Hill-directed adaptation "Hawaii" (namely, the massive James Michener novel), 1970's "The Hawaiians," directed by Tom Gries, is not exactly a sequel in the traditional sense. Clocking at about two hours and thirteen minutes, "The Hawaiians" covers more ground than "Hawaii" (which was based on the novel's third chapter), but in order to do so the film moves at a gallop: Years and even decades flash by between one scene and the next.

But what a ride. Charlton Heston stars as Whip Hoxworth, a sea captain who decides to stick to the land once his grandfather dies and leaves him a parcel of useless ground -- but no money. Whip's wife Purity (Geraldine Chaplin), who is one-quarter Hawaiian and descended of royal lineage, insists that he forsake the sea, so Whip decides to turn his patch of acreage into a plantation. He needs water, and something to grow; through hard-headed persistence and a little legerdemain, he acquires both and in time he's successfully growing pineapples and dabbling in real estate.

Whip also acquires some human capital in the form of Mun Ki (Mako), a Chinese laborer who has indentured himself for the chance to work abroad and make money to send him to his wife. While he's away from China, Mun Ki follows a tradition of taking a second wife, Nyuk Tsin (Tina Chen), whose children will be regarded as the sons (and daughter) of the wife back in China; Tsin will be the "Auntie" of her own children.

As the decades pass the kids grow up and Tsin flourishes -- and helps Whip to flourish, also. The story's scale is large enough to accommodate extended absences, reversals of fortune, and seismic social and political upheavals, but the focus remains always on Whip and Tsin and their families.

Both films were produced by Walter Mirisch, and there's a bigness and completeness in the production and design of the movie that gives "The Hawaiians" an epic feel. The film's transfer to Blu-ray is crisp, though a little dark -- due, one suspects, more to the film stock used than the work of cinematographers Lucien Ballard and Philip Lathrop. Henry Mancini's score is lush (though a little dated in places), and the Twilight Time Blu-ray release gives the music an isolated track.

That isolated score track and an essay by Julie Kirgo in the disc's accompanying booklet are the only extras of note. Kirgo does her usual lively, film-trivia rich work in the essay, rightly praising Tina Chen's performance and noting of Heston's Whip that he treats his workers "not always fairly." (He doesn't seem especially concerned about treating anyone fairly, whether they work for him or not: Early in the film, catching sight of Purity after a long sea voyage, he's in such a hurry to reach her that he shoves a passer-by right off the wharf and into he ocean without a second look.)

What's also true, though, is how enlightened Whip is for his time; it's the latter half of the 19th century and here he is giving a Chinese woman remarkable latitude to improve her lot, and his own. Moreover, though the film touches on the issue only briefly, Whip sacrifices a great deal of his social respectability by marrying Purity and, after she goes mad and leaves him, taking up with a Japanese immigrant; eventually, despite being dead set against his son Noel (John Phillip Law) following his heart and marrying Tsin's daughter, he allows the union (and so does the ever-pragmatic Tsin, despite her own objections). Under that touch colonial shell, it seems, there beats the heart of an old softie.

"The Hawaiians"
Blu-ray
$29.95
http://www.screenarchives.com/title_detail.cfm/ID/30903/THE-HAWAIIANS-1970