There were 12 films nominated for the Outstanding Production Academy Award of 1935. Aside from the eventual winner in Frank Lloyd's Mutiny on the Bounty the other 11 nominees were Alice Adams, Broadway Melody of 1936, Captain Blood, David Copperfield, The Informer, Les Miserables, Lives of a Bengal Lancer, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Naughty Marietta, Ruggles of Red Gap and Top Hat.

As befits virtually any year in the Academy Awards nomination process, let alone the prospects of a film's commercial successes or the laurels offered from on high in the critical establishment, two other genre movies were left out of the year's cattle call of celebration. Namely, the then-contemporary movie art custodians overlooked The Thirty-Nine Steps and The Bride of Frankenstein. To avoid making the same mistake we would do well to remember how the Outstanding Production winner's many impressive virtues haven't led to its being any more, but perhaps less, famous than either Alfred Hitchcock's thriller or James Whale's horror show.

All this hindsight commentary is meant to simply say that pathways to winning achievement in the arts are anything but a straightforward undertaking. Because such endeavors are a complicated, politically charged and personally biased process, especially with their dependence on people and their ever wavering criteria for offering judgments, Mutiny on the Bounty is a fine, fine film and representative title illuminating the essence of studio style. It is also a grand adventure with a compelling story, wonderful male leads and impressive production design elements that give the picture a rich sense of escape for moviegoers.

Though the tagline eschewed the more serious topic of mutiny explicit in the film's title, "A Thousand Hours of Hell For One Moment of Love!" certainly spoke to the romantic sweep of this MGM adventure. Adapted from the novels by Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall by Jules Furthman, Talbot Jennings and Carey Wilson and produced for nearly $2 million, Mutiny on the Bounty gives roughly even-handed attention to the conditions onboard the sailing ship Bounty along with the company's resulting revolt.

Opening with the sailing ship making fit to sail, iron-fisted Captain Bligh (Charles Laughton) watches his crew lash themselves in for adventure under the temperance of his well-healed right hand, Lt. Fletcher Christian (Clark Gable). Once on the ocean, however, Bligh's cruelty and despotism slowly rots away at the crew. Gaining a temporary reprieve when the ship puts to shore on a South Seas island paradise, supplies are replenished, repairs are performed and the crew's psychology changes unalterably.

Several men fall in love with the tropical life and its native women thereby proving themselves reluctant to leave when Bligh gives the order to go. Returned to the sea their rebellious spirit is kindled under the captain's familiar rule by force until Christian reluctantly leads a mutiny against him.

Pitching Bligh overboard with his loyalists in a raft, the Bounty's sailors make themselves sea-going criminals in the eyes of the Royal Navy. Seeking succor they leave their former captain who separately manages his rescue and return to England just as they return to the island paradise for supplies and to gather loved ones. Finally resolving for parts unknown with the hope of escaping Bligh's vengeance, the Bounty's final fortunes are left a mystery on the high seas.

Throughout the film Laughton electrifies the screen with his inhuman Captain Bligh just as Gable's sympathetic Fletcher Christian sees the actor's stardom continue in the orbit eventually cemented in Gone with the Wind. Interestingly, and in contrast to his role, Laughton was terrified of the ocean and found himself seasick through most of the production. In similar emasculating fashion Gable was himself forced to shave his trademark moustache for historical accuracy since facial hair wasn't allowed in the British navy during the period represented in the film.

An important aspect of the two lead players and their sacrifices for the film is the inspiration of their commitment to a studio employer based on acting contracts that obligated their participation. This contract relationship was itself a component of MGM's studio style along with literary sourcing to allow a producer like Irving Thalberg to create epic films with a sweeping historical backdrops and rich performances. The issue of studio style then, aside from specific projects produced within the system, is one of the main reasons for the successes enjoyed by Mutiny on the Bounty.

The point is driven home when realizing MGM's influence over the first 12 years of the Academy Awards. During the period MGM enjoyed five picture of the year wins for The Broadway Melody in 1928-1929, Grand Hotel in 1931-1932, Mutiny on the Bounty in 1935, The Great Ziegfeld in 1936 and Gone with the Wind in 1939. Dispute over the merits of each title in light of its listed competition continues to this day but it remains clear that the awards themselves weren't earned simply for the films acting alone as much as they were also meant to gratify powerful film personalities.

Remembering that MGM head Louis B. Mayer was the prime mover behind setting up the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences it's obvious that his studio was prominent in the annual Oscars ceremony, as it was first called in 1934. Likewise MGM movies were exactly the type most suited to the taste of Academy voters throughout the Golden Age of classical Hollywood precisely because they were, partially, a reflection of Mayer's sensibility.

Combining the biggest stars available with the most celebrated source materials or original scripts and then producing films with the best craftspeople in Hollywood were MGM's trademarks. The simple coup of combining skill, fame, talent and top dollar led to the wholesale dominance of the studio from the 1920's through the 1940s. One effect of this dominance, of course, is that MGM's films were unique in comparison to the work of other studios that were similarly pigeonholed according the tastes of dominant producers, contract talent and commercial considerations.

Where MGM concentrated on star-studded productions largely groomed from bestsellers and stage hits, often in the form of larger-than-life musicals, Warner Bros. was preoccupied with smaller budgets and socially conscious melodramas. Columbia produced high-end, literary films with some of the most famous directors in Hollywood, Universal focused on B-movie horrors and westerns and the divergence among productions continued on through the other studios, RKO, Paramount, Fox and United Artists included, each of which had a unique stamp and position in the marketplace.

Borders between studio and styles were porous yet there was a discernible end product differentiating each house from the other. If it wasn't possible to tell from a film's overall production value, there was usually a clear indicator in the associated artisans, actors and actresses that were easily sorted according to previous affiliations and growing filmographies.

For Mutiny on the Bounty only the cream of MGM's technical crop was used. Thalberg hired Frank Lloyd who had previously been celebrated for his directorial excellence in 1929's Drag, Weary River and The Divine Lady and 1933's Cavalcade. He then added the noted art directors Cedric Gibbons and A. Arnold Gillespie, each of whom were long standing MGM contractors, the cinematographer Arthur Edeson and former Louis B. Mayer protégé turned editor Margaret Booth. Complimenting their efforts were the composers Nat W. Finston and Herbert Stothart and the previously mentioned cast headlined by Laughton and Gable but filled out by Franchot Tone with James Cagney and David Niven in uncredited bit parts.

One effect of this expensively combined pool of talents carefully funneled through the vision of Thalberg's production enterprise is a film of unqualified beauty. Mutiny on the Bounty has a richly textured look and feel that remains stunning to this day, though to a greater extent when projected instead of screened on home theater equipment. Consideration must also be given for the acting styles of the mid-'30s that differ from our current and more naturalistic tendencies, not to mention the film's relatively broad audience appeal that avoids controversial content save for the depiction of mutiny, however justified.

As the product of MGM's studio machinery and as the result of numerous creative efforts practiced at their peak of excellence, Mutiny on the Bounty is a treasure from the vault of time. That its success and celebration superseded the equally important accomplishments of other films like The Thirty-Nine Steps and The Bride of Frankenstein is not a slight to these other titles insomuch as it's a realization of how Academy politics reward insider productions, especially when they remain worthy of such distinction.