Plot summary

1993 Made-for-TV movie with Rutger Hauer, Karen Allen, Eric Roberts. Another imitation of Dead Calm, this one is more successful than the others. I'll give you the negatives first. It's predictable, the bad guys are very one dimensional, and, like Dead Calm, there's a point where you'll be screaming at the screen, ranting for a modicum of common sense from the lead character. On the other hand, the lead characters have a lot more depth, and Rutger Hauer and Karen Allen portray a couple approaching middle age, with all the associated health and emotional problems, quite well. They're attractive without being blow-dried pretty. Despite its predictability (and one or two jarring flights from common sense), the story is actually pretty good, and it takes place mostly on the sailboat. The story line takes the boat and crew from Monaco to Malta in a series of short hops down the Italian coast, making good use of some beautiful coast (Corsica and Sardinia), and good sailing. And the boat is utterly gorgeous; a sixty foot Chebec ketch named Charlie the Bird. All the deck scenes were done on the boat, most of the interior scenes looked like the real thing, and the sailing sequences are worth renting the movie for.
Available VHS

Cast

• Rutger Hauer as Morgan Norvell
• Eric Roberts
  Eric Roberts
  Eric Anthony Roberts is an American actor. His career began with King of the Gypsies , earning a Golden Globe nomination for best actor debut. He starred as the protagonist in the 1980 dramatisation of Willa Cather's 1905 short story, Paul's Case...
  
   as Gil Freeland
• Karen Allen
  Karen Allen
  Karen Jane Allen is an American actress best known for her role as Marion Ravenwood in Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull...
  
   as Catherine 'Kit' Norvell
• Connie Nielsen as Ronnie Freeland
• Hazel Ellerby as Maria
• Larry Powell as Business Man
• Peter Baldacchino as Louis
• Martin Corrado as First Bar Man
• Joe Zarb Cousin as Second Bar Man
• Phyllis Carlysle as First Woman Photographed
• Sue Ellen Denisen as Second Woman Photographed
• Betty Mitchell as Bar Client

Soundtrack

• "Yesterday Once More" (Bettis-Carpenter)
• "Rocket Man" (Written by Elton John
  Elton John
  Sir Elton Hercules John, CBE, Hon DMus is an English rock singer-songwriter, composer, pianist and occasional actor...
  
   and Bernie Taupin
  Bernie Taupin
  Bernard John "Bernie" Taupin is an English lyricist, poet, and singer, best known for his long-term collaboration with Elton John, writing the lyrics for the majority of the star's songs, making his lyrics some of the best known in pop-rock's history.In 1967, Taupin answered an advertisement in...
  
  )