Budd's final words, "God bless Captain Vere!", Vere crumbles, and Budd is subsequently hoisted up and hanged on the ship's rigging. The crew is on the verge of mutiny over the incident, but Vere can only stare off into the distance. Just as the crew is to be fired upon by the ship's marine detachment, a French vessel appears and commences cannon fire on the Avenger. The crew breaks off from the potential mutinty to return fire, and in the course of battle a piece of the ship's rigging falls on Vere, killing him. The ship's figurehead is also shot off while a narrator tells of Budd's heroic sacrifice. Cast Robert Ryan as John Claggart, Master d'Arms Peter Ustinov as Edwin Fairfax Vere, Post Captain Terence Stamp as Billy Budd Melvyn Douglas as The Dansker, sailmaker Paul Rogers as Philip Seymour, 1st Lieutenant John Neville as Julian Radcliffe, 2nd Lieutenant David McCallum as Steven Wyatt, Gunnery Officer Ronald Lewis as Enoch Jenkins, maintopman Lee Montague as Squeak, Mr. Claggart's assistant Thomas Heathcote as Alan Payne, maintopman Ray McAnally as William O'Daniel, maintopman Robert Brown as Talbot John Meillon as Neil Kincaid, maintopman Cyril Luckham as Hallam, Captain of Marines Niall MacGinnis as Captain Nathaniel Graveling Production In addition to serving as director, Ustinov also produces and co-stars in the feature. His dedication to the film appears to emanate from his identification with the characters in the story. He said, "I am an optimist, unrepentant and militant. After all, in order not to be a fool an optimist must know how sad a place the world can be. It is only the pessimist who finds this out anew every day." On the novel itself, Melville had been writing poetry for 30 years when he returned to fiction with Billy Budd in late 1888. Still unfinished when he died in 1891, Melville's widow worked to help complete it, but it remained unpublished. Melville's biographer accidentally stumbled upon it when going through a trunk of the writer's papers in his granddaughter's New Jersey home in 1919, and it was finally published in 1924. Over the years other versions were published, but it was not until Melville's original notes were found that the definitive version was ultimately published in 1962. Coincidentally, this movie version, made in continental Europe and England, was released the same year. Reception Stanley Kauffmann of The New Republic wrote Billy