The accidental booty in A High Wind in Jamaica is a brood of children bound for England and a civil education. When their ship is captured by none other than Juan Chavez (Anthony Quinn), a pirate captain with a heart of doubloons, they find themselves getting a seaworthy tutorial in the three Rs-recklessness, ribaldry, and ransacking. The craggy cap'n soon grows fond of his pro forma family, especially the ebullient Emily, but the chummy crew finds their presence an ill omen aboard a pirate ship. Not that the shanghaied kids are all innocence-they definitely fly under the flag of mischief. Adapted from the much-admired 1927 story by Richard Hughes, Mackendrick's underrated version jettisons the outright ruthlessness of the novel's Victorian brats for a pack of prank-players with a streak of unconscious cruelty. In this subtly told tale, the pirate captors will be undone not by sword or cannon, but by the incivility of youth.