good back-story, and good acting

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

The Cay was one's most important movie in my childhood,l was fourteen years old when l'd watched this picture together with my grandfather in 1976 and has a special meaning to me...firstly because l was a teenager and it was made for this audience,l've looking for this movie a long time without success but now l found it on Youtube even no subtitles with original audio it was worth to see for the second time after 41 years of waiting,l didn't notice that it was so short...seeing James Earl Jones as Timothy in a fantastic performance,hope someday this picture came out on DVD..who knows!!!Resume: First watch: 1976 / How many: 2 / Source: TV-Youtube / Rating: 7.5

Since I was not yet born in the 70's, I watched it on YouTube recently. I thought the book was great, it had emotional power and I feel like all characters were really likable.The movie, however, lacks some important detail. In the movie, you barely get to know either of Phillip's parents, but in the book, it explains how hard working Phillip's dad was and how protective Phillip's mom was. It explains they lived in Virginia, and the mom wanted to go back, and soon convinced the father to agree. The only statement in the movie was Phillip stating whatever his mom wants gets.As well, at one point Phillip went overboard the raft, and Timothy saved him, showing how caring he was. In the movie, Timothy is still caring, but more examples seem to be shown in the book.I also feel the sound quality wasn't that good of the movie. You could always hear the breeze in the background, making it hard to understand what the characters were saying.However, James Earl Jones had a really good performance. If you were drawn in by Timothy's character, you won't be disappointed.

Back when I was in elementary school, my teachers would sometimes show the film strip of "The Cay" on days when there was little to do or they just wanted the students to unwind, like before holiday vacations or on rainy days after lunch. I used to love watching it, but unfortunately, I haven't seen it since probably second or third grade (which would be about 1987!). I agree with another commenter, that it is ashame that this film hasn't been made available on video or DVD. It is a very worthwhile film, especially for children.

"The Cay" is one of the best books to have been written for children in recent years,and it is now used as a school text in Britain and America.The 1974 T.V.production,starring James Earl Jones as Timothy and Alfred Lutter as Philip,was an excellent film version of this story,and it is a pity that it has not yet appeared as a video.Schools,I know,would make use of it,and its many fans would buy it.It is still going the rounds of European T.V.networks,and I last saw it on Polish T.V.in 2000.