Seven Were Saved (1947) User Reviews (14)

Simple But Decent B-Movie

[sddavis63 · 6/10 · 23 August 2011]

There is absolutely nothing fancy about this. It's a simple story with a simple set. While escorting an accused Japanese war criminal to his trial in Manila, an American air force plane crashes in the South China Sea, and the passengers and crew (including the Japanese war criminal) have to find a way to work together to survive until they're rescued. Along the way they face the sorts of things you would expect in the circumstances - a lack of food and water, injuries from the crash, tension around the presence of Colonel Yamura, shark attacks, etc. Almost the entire movie is set on the life raft, so the composite cast had to work together pretty well in order to make this interesting - and for the most part they succeeded. Catherine Craig and Richard Denning had the most significant parts as the two on the raft who seemed to be the most in control, and they did well with their parts. The basic bit of suspense in the movie is which seven are going to survive. The title tells us that there will be seven, but there are eight survivors of the crash, so it's a bit of a guessing game as to which one isn't going to make it.

This seems to be a bit of a tribute to American air and sea rescue forces, and it's interesting enough to see how they handle the rescue once the raft is discovered. It's a definite B-Movie, but it's not a bad one. (6/10)

Who will not survive?

[ulicknormanowen · 5/10 · 18 March 2021]

Coming after Hitchcock's "lifeboat" and before Richard Sale's "seven waves away" aka "abandon ship" , "seven were saved" suffers by comparison ; it has neither the suspense of the former nor the cruel realistic strength of the latter.

The title is stupid ,for it spoils most of the interest ; okay ,it's not the person one thinks the wreck will cost him his life but that's it .Made on a shoestring budget , the movie makes the best of it ,even though it has not much to offer.

Survival At Sea.

[rmax304823 · 6/10 · 20 October 2013]

A C-47 carrying diverse passengers crashes at sea off course and after several days of tribulation are finally found and picked up by an Air/Sea Rescue PBY flying boat.

Seven seems to be a popular number in movie titles -- "Seven Men From Now," "Seven Ways from Sundown," "Se7en." There's a regularity to the word. You could almost eliminate the vowels and it would still be intelligible, as it would be in Hebrew or Arabic. And "seven" is euphonious. It's neatly balanced. It just wouldn't be the same if it were "Eighteen Were Saved." If we ignore the requisite romantic triangles -- there are two -- it's basically two stories: the search for survivors of the crash, adrift somewhere in a rubber life raft, and the procedures used by Air/Sea Rescue. The emphasis is on the trials experienced by the survivors. This could be Alfred Hitchcock's "Lifeboat" if it had more money, better actors, and more talented writers and director. The similarities are obvious. Aboard the raft are a nurse, a pilot who is nominally in charge but is blinded, a suicide, a wisecracking enlisted man with a wounded leg, and an enemy prisoner of war.

The prisoner is Captain Yamura, headed for a war-crimes trial and the noose. He's played with the usual sneer by Richard Loo, the Hawaiian-born Chinese, Hollywood's favorite "Jap" during the war years. This movie was released two years after the war but apparently we hadn't forgiven the Japanese because Loo is nothing if not treacherous and cynical. Ironically, his lines were designed to make him sound bloodthirsty but in fact he makes one or two good points.

Good shots of PBYs taking off and landing, several times at an airport in the Pacific and one on the sea. The PBYs were an old design, dating from the mid-30s, and they had long range, as befits a patrol plane, but nothing else that was special. They were slow and underarmed compared to their Japanese counterparts. But they LOOKED inviting. The fuselage had all sorts of bumps and blisters and windows, suggesting an interior made of nooks and crannies. The flight engineer sat inside the pylon that held the parasol wing high up above the spray. Most multi-engined aircraft of the period, like the C-47, although aerodynamically much more sound, were dull inside. Nothing but empty space.

You don't see many flying boats anymore, just light airplanes with floats that enable them to land on isolated lakes. Nobody needs flying boats. Every one-horse town, every minuscule island, now has its own airstrip. How extraordinarily ordinary.

If Hitchcock Can Do It, Then So Can Bill Pine

[boblipton · 6/10 · 13 November 2019]

A plane bound for Manilla is skyjacked by Richard Loo and crashes several hundred miles off course. While the survivors squabble and struggle in a life raft, the Sea Air Rescue Service searches for them.

If that half-sounds like Hitchcock's LIFEBOAT with Catherine Craig sitting in for Tallulah Bankhead, that's how it struck me. It's produced by William Pine and William Thomas, and the Dollar Bills never saw a plot they didn't like -- even if the Hitchcock original was one of his few financial failures. Add in the rescue effort, and have William Pine make one of his occasional directorial appearance, and profits would flow. A few Hero Poses of Richard Denning -- doing a Joel McCrea impersonation -- with Miss Craig looking up at him adoringly, and Bob's your uncle.

Any subtext is buried way down, and the bravura composition work that Hitch and his crew accomplished is missing, but the Dollar Bills knew how to get a bang for their buck. It doesn't aspire to be a great picture, but it accomplishes its modest goals of filling 75 minutes entertainingly.

Seven Were Saved

[CinemaSerf · 6/10 · 8 January 2023]

A Japanese colonel being transported to face war crimes charges in the Philippines causes his transport plane to crash in the middle of the South China Sea and the survivors must battle each other and the elements whilst the air sea rescue service try to find them. At times there is a little jeopardy as they gradually run out of supplies and mishaps begin to befall their party, and tensions mount too as the pilot "Capt. Danton" (Richard Denning) insists that they share their meagre rations with their enemy but oddly enough the film is just too short to do the plot justice and the ending is really rather flat.

Movie Will Put You to Sleep - Seven Were Saved

[arthur_tafero · 4/10 · 3 August 2022]

This film is a bad combination of Lifeboat and a hundred other films. The acting is pretty bad, and the cinematography reminded me of Stan and Ollie in the French Foreign Legion in Flying Deuces. Other than that the film is almost watchable. Actually, its not watchable; don't waste your time.

What's that Jap doing on the plane!

[kapelusznik18 · 6/10 · 26 March 2015]

***SPOILERS*** What can truly be said to be a re-make, three years later, of the Alfred Hitchcock lost at sea thriller "Lifeboat" the film "Seven Were Saved" has a number of American service men & women stranded on a life raft in the middle of the South China Sea due to the treachery of a Japanese POW Col. Yamura played by Chinese/American actor Richard Loo a veteran in playing Japanese bad guys in movies during WWII. It was Col. Yamura who on his way to Manila to be tried as a war criminal who hijacked the plane and, in a kamikaze like swan dive, crashed it into the sea with all aboard!

In the middle of nowhere and with no help in sight the plane's captain Allen Denton,Richard Denning, takes command of the life raft guiding it, by following the stars, to the safety of the nearest land mass or island that could well be as far as 800 miles away. As for that suicidal creep Col. Yamura, he was lucky that, unlike U-boat Captain Schmit in the movie "Lifeboat", he wasn't lynched and thrown overboard, as shark bait,by the enraged plane crash survivors! We also have the story of US Navy nurse Susan Briscoe, Catherine Craig, who's believe to be dead, shot by the Japs in WWII, husband Philip Smith, Keith Richards, who had since lost his memory due to malaria is also, small world isn't it, one of the plane passenger on his way home to be treated in a US military hospital.

****SPOILERS****Life saving ending with Susan's boyfriend and future husband Capt. Jim Willis,Russell Hayden, suffering from a high fever sneaking out of the hospital and without the proper papers taking command of the rescue crew in finding the life raft with all those on board. As if by extrasensory perception Wills does contacts the life raft and in the end saves Susan and the all it's surviving members including the ungrateful, in not being killed on the spot, Col.Namura who's well on his way to be executed, after being found guilty, in Malia as war major war criminal. As for both Susan and Captain Willis they don't have to worry about Susan's known to be dead husband Philip Smith standing in the way of their marriage! In a supreme act of self sacrifice he earlier committed suicide by jumping overboard after his memory came back and he found out he'll, in being legally married to Susan, prevent the marriage, as well as committing an act of bigamy, from happening!

Melodrama in another Lifeboat

[bkoganbing · 4/10 · 14 March 2014]

Seven Were Saved was another project from the 'Dollar Bills' of Paramount, that B unit production company that churned out a lot of the second features for Paramount, stuff that got 2nd billed to main features that Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, and Alan Ladd when they were being shown. It's a story of air/sea rescue post World War II and had they stuck to that it might have been a decent film. William Pine and William Thomas were the 'dollar bills'.

Instead we got a cut rate version of Lifeboat when an army transport plane went down and several people were stranded in a rubber lifeboat the plane carried. How it happened was a bit on the bizarre side also. Richard Loo who was of Chinese background played many a cruel Japanese officer during and after World War II. He's in custody going to trial for war crimes in the Phillipines, but breaks free and tries to hijack the plane. It goes sufficiently off course to make tracking most difficult.

Richard Denning is piloting the plane and Catherine Craig otherwise known as Mrs. Robert Preston is an army nurse is one of the passengers and married to Russell Hayden. Hayden is one of the air/sea rescue pilots who's temporarily out of action and he breaks regulation to aid in the rescue.

I won't go into the melodrama in the lifeboat, you saw it all before and better with Alfred Hitchcock.

Post war intrigue in the Pacific.

[mark.waltz · 6/10 · 3 April 2019]

A surprisingly good lower half of the bill from the Pine/Thomas independent division of Paramount which specialized during the war in fast-moving action pictures. Now the war has been over for 2 years, and they turn out a hidden gem, very similar in theme to "Lifeboat" and also reminding me of 1939 ""Five Came Back" (and its 1956 remake "Back From Eternity") as well as the 1957 masterpiece "Abandon Ship!", All dealing with one important necessity: survival. The presence of a Japanese prisoner of war (Richard Loo) will instantly remind viewers of the Walter Slezak character in Hitchcock's masterpiece "Lifeboat", but other than being responsible for the crash into the Atlantic ocean, Loo really is an insignificant character.

More is the pity that he didn't use his cunning to cause dissension on the lifeboat after their plane crashes, but the writers were wise in wanting to avoid comparisons to that 1944 classic. Instead, the film concentrates on the various obstacles that occur after the plane crashes which includes temporary blindness for the pilot who is the only one who can get them to safety. A searching party does their best to get a larger lifeboat to them, but by the time they get there, it looks like they have all expired in the Pacific sun. Richard Denning, Catherine Craig and Russell Hayden are all believable in their parts, with Craig admirably tough. William H. Pine's directions allows for believably blurry and dark photography which adds to the mood of the film. As a post war film, this strikes a cord on several directions, and is worth seeking out for fans of that genre.

Adrift at Sea

[Uriah43 · 5/10 · 31 March 2016]

This movie takes place a year after World War II and features a United States air-sea rescue pilot by the name of "Captain Jim Willis" (Russell Hayden) who is stationed on an island in the South China Sea and flies a PBY in search of survivors who might be shipwrecked in that area. His fiancé, "Lieutenant Susan Briscoe" (Catherine Craig) is a nurse who also works in that area and is eager for the both of them to return to the United States where they can get married and start a family. Unfortunately, a quarrel breaks out between them when Jim decides to extend his tour of duty and as a result Susan decides to leave not long afterward in order to escort a sick patient to Manila and from there to the United States. Another key passenger just happens to be a Japanese prisoner by the name of "Colonel Yamura" (Richard Loo) who is about to be tried for war crimes. As luck would have it, Colonel Yamura manages to temporarily skyjack the plane which then results in it crashing into the ocean. Eight passengers manage to survive in a life raft but with limited rations the question soon becomes whether any of them will be able to survive the rough seas of the shark-infested waters long enough to be rescued. Now rather than reveal any more I will just say that this turned out to be an okay film which suffered from a lack of suspense and a rather predictable ending. Part of the problem for that was the title which clearly disclosed how many passengers would eventually be saved. Additionally, it also had a grade-B quality to it from start-to-finish. In any case, while this movie clearly wasn't great by any means, it still managed to keep my attention for the most part and I have rated it accordingly. Average.

Big Studio Dreaming B Film

[DKosty123 · 6/10 · 12 December 2018]

This film is barely over an hour long but it ia an active hour. It is about a sea rescue of 7 victims of an attempted air high jacking in the 1940's that is so stupid that it goes entirely wrong. The pilot winds up having to crash the plane into the ocean and 8 folks including one of the most foolish high jackers ever on film wind up on a life boat for several days,

The story is also about the the air sea rescue teams who go out lookings for air flight crash survivors. The film is made slickly by a small production company which asembles a largely unknown cast into a pretty good script for the ensemble cast to make a pretty good dramatic effort. It differs from Hitchcocks "Lifeboat" from the same film era because of the World War 2 theme and the lower price production by an independent producer.

While not a classic, it is an okay film whose short length is a benefit because it makes the drama better with few of the dead spots a longer film would have. The title indicates how things turn out.

Worth watching, but it's B roots are showing...

[planktonrules · 5/10 · 25 November 2011]

This is an enjoyable film, however, it's very far from a great film--mostly due to an uneven script. Like many B-movies, you can see this one was rushed into production--warts and all.

"Seven Were Saved" is set in the final days of WWII in the Pacific. The focus in the beginning of the film is on an air-sea rescue pilot that flies Catalinas. He is planning on getting married to a young lieutenant but just before they are separated, they argue. Not surprisingly, due to the film title and cliché, the lady is among a group lost at sea. The survivors cling to life in a raft--hoping to somehow be saved in the very vast ocean.

The idea isn't bad--sort of like a poor man's version of "Lifeboat". But unlike the Hitchcock film, the writing has an awful lot of clichés. For example, just by chance, one member of this group recognizes the injured man brought aboard--he's her husband!!! And, while she loves him, he was assume killed and she's remarried. And, given the clichéd style, you KNOW that by the end of the film this guy will be dead!! There are a few other minor glitches here and there, but the actors (Especially Richard Denning) try their best. Interesting but quite flawed.

Air sea rescue after a prisoner escapes and a plane runs out of fuel

[SimonJack · 6/10 · 5 June 2022]

"Seven Were Saved" takes place at the end of World War II. An Army Air Force plane is flying to the Philippines with several military passengers on board. One is a nurse and one is a POW Japanese colonel. He is under guard and going to the Philippines to stand trial there for war crimes. He throws hot coffee on the solder guarding him and grabs the pistol from his holster. After shooting the officer escort, knocking out the navigator and shooting the copilot, he hijacks the plane. He sends it off in a different direction, apparently intending to take his chances on a small island somewhere. But when the plane runs out of gas and crashes in the sea, eight people make it to the raft.

The colonel has lost the pistol and now all have to try to stay alive until rescued But they have flown a couple hundred miles off their course. So, the sea rescue planes sent out don't find them anywhere. After more than a week, the head of the rescue operations decides to stop the searches. But, one pilot, who had been sick and grounded, decided to make one last sweep outside their known route. The nurse onboard was his sweetheart. Well, one can guess how this will come out. Before they are ultimately rescued, one of the men who had been ill disappears over the side during the night.

This isn't a remake of Alfred Hitchcock's 1944 "Lifeboat," but that film no doubt influenced Paramount on this film. The prologue on the screen dedicates the film "to the men of the AAF Air Sea Rescue Service, who risk their lives daily that others may live."

Instead of trying to be so sociable and humorous, the Sergeant should have been more alert guarding the prisoner. After he tells the nurse that he would have a cup of coffee and it would be okay for the prisoner to have a cup, he says, "You know, I really can't stand coffee. I just take it to cure my insomnia."

This is a B-level film with no prominent actors among the cast. But, they all give good performances.

Not even Hitchcock could save this lifeboat

[adrianovasconcelos · 3/10 · 7 January 2024]

Apart from Richard Denning, of whom I have not seen very much anyway, I know nobody in this obviously amateurish cast orchestrated by Mr Pine, a complete unknown as a director who, on the strength of this work, really should consider some other profession for a living.

Two Hitchcock films come to mind as the film opens: FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT (1940) and LIFEBOAT (1944). Of course, unless you mistake the forest for the tree, Mr Pine is unable to even slightly imitate the plane crash into the ocean in FOREIGN, and he certainly cannot keep dialogue flowing in the lifeboat, besides a sad inbility to extract decent acting from the players.

With cinematography typical of C, at best a B production, it is the script that really sends this film down the chutes: a Japanese Army colonel is being taken WITHOUT so much as handcuffs clapped on him to a trial for war crimes in Manila, the Philippines. Needless to say, the Japanese officer is no dimwit and has nothing to lose, so he grabs his watcher's gun, takes over the aircraft and forces it to change course until brave Denning dives into the sea with his arms around his head for protection.

Before that, we learn of the completely unnecessary presence of an amnesiac. That amnesia is recognized by his wife (small world and even smaller lifeboat!) and he leaves a written message which somehow survives the lifeboat's capsizing. Most curious of all, Catherine Craig leaves her hubby-to-be on land and starts having the hots for Captain Denning, who first gets a bandage over his left eye, then is blinded by sun glare in his right eye, but somehow knows the course thanks to the stars. Craig French-kisses him when they are back on land, under the watchful eye of hubby-to-be. Her explanation: she wants kids with the cuckold.

I caught myself wondering about such trivial things as how did the lifeboat occupants get rid of their excretions? Back in WWII, it was poor form for women to do it in public.

It was commendable that the Japanese colonel was kept alive but he just disappears from the narrative when the rescue happens, and whether or not he reached Manila and paid for his evil doings we will never know. And, frankly, I could not care.

Total waste of 71 minutes in one's life. 3/10.