South Pacific

Set in the South Pacific during the Second World War, this musical romance centres on Nellie Forbush, a US Navy nurse from Little Rock, and Emile de Becque, a French planter she meets on an island where American forces are preparing for operations against the Japanese. Emile, who has lived there for years, wants Nellie, but his past makes her hesitate. At the same time, Marine lieutenant Joseph Cable falls for Liat, a young islander, and finds that his feelings collide with his own attitudes toward her background. Sailors and nurses stage a musical show while waiting for the war to reach them, and the fighting eventually draws the men into a dangerous mission.

The film adapts the Rodgers and Hammerstein stage musical, itself drawn from James A. Michener's stories of the Pacific campaign, with a screenplay by Paul Osborn and Buddy Adler producing. Joshua Logan directed it between Sayonara (1957) and Fanny (1961), the fourth of the eight films listed in his directing career. Rossano Brazzi plays Emile, Mitzi Gaynor plays Nellie, John Kerr plays Cable, and Ray Walston, Juanita Hall and France Nuyen appear among a credited cast of 187.

Made for about 6 million dollars, it returned roughly 37 million worldwide, a strong result at the time. On IMDb it holds 6.8/10 from around 11,000 votes; on TMDB it stands at 6.1/10 from 121 votes. A critics' rating of 6.5/10 from 12 reviews sits a little below the larger IMDb audience sample.