I watched this movie a few times years ago, and decided to give it another watch this past weekend. It’s a great sea battle movie set in the 1800s during the Napoleonic wars, when British naval officer, Captain Jack “Lucky Jack” Aubrey (played by Russell Crowe) is given orders to set sail on HMS Surprise to intercept a French ship, the Acheron. It wasn’t until I watched it again this time around, that I googled it to see if it was based on a true story, and was surprised to find out that its actually based on a novel series of approximately 20 novels by author Patrick O’Brian on the war adventures of Captain Aubrey, and his good friend, the ship surgeon, Dr. Stephen Maturin (played by Paul Bettany). Now I’m interested in giving the book series a try someday soon.

There’s plenty to enjoy in the movie. The tricks Captain Aubrey pulls to confuse the enemy. The cinematography of the battle scenes. The military protocols that they follow (not everybody is going to be fascinated by this, but I was. I don’t know why that is- maybe because there’s an order to things- and maybe I like order instead of chaos?).

Speaking of protocols, there were some officers (or officers in training) on board the ship that were very young. I’m talking younger than eighteen. So that piqued my curiosity, and I googled it. And interestingly, during that time, boys young as twelve or thirteen were allowed to enter officer cadet training. That’s pretty surreal! Can you imagine today, if we had United States marines that were 12 years old?? (The British have since that time raised the age to eighteen. Thats one thing I like about historical period movies- you can often learn things about history that you did not know before.

Anyway, if you like military/war/sea adventure movies- give this one a check out!