One swashbuckling thriller of a pirate yarn, Captain Blood is the tale of an Irish doctor sent -- through an unfortunate twist of events during the English Civil War -- as a slave to the East Indies where he then -- by another sequence of events -- turns pirate. (And then of course, **SPOILERS** rescues the town and earns the undying gratitude of the king and wins the love of his lady. But you don’t want to hear about all that, right? ;D **END SPOILERS**)
Olivia de Havilland is one of my favorite classic actresses, so I jumped at the chance of participating in the 4th Olivia de Havilland Blogathon with this. :)
In all of her films (that I’ve seen thus far), I love how she can so delicately portray a lighthearted bubbly heroine, who can still deeply feel others' pain like a cut to the heart.
Her well-known epitome role in this regard would be Lady Marian, but this first film could easily rival what she did in The Adventures of Robin Hood. With her delightful accent and delivery of lines, she’s able to show real compassion, and also fire up and be a bit feisty without being terribly pigheaded.
I think she does an excellent job portraying sheltered, sometimes inexperienced heroines, with real depth. In other words, she’s able to pull off naivete with real sweetness and not irritating empty-headedness.
As for Errol Flynn’s part… He’s excellent in the part of the doctor-turned-pirate-leader, and as it’s one of his first break out roles and his first starring with de Havilland, it’s worth watching for cinematic history alone.
The true archetypal Flynn villain (I speak, obviously, of Basil Rathbone ;)) even makes an appearance, his brief partnership with Captain Blood culminating in a sword flashing duel on a properly tropical beach.
Family friendly wise, there are quite a few slave scenes (including branding and whipping episodes) so just wanna be aware of that and maybe have the fast forward button at the ready with younger folk. Oh, and of course there's all the piratical swordplay.
Romantic and a classic pirate epic, it’s definitely worth adding to your repertoire. I’d love to hear if you’ve seen it!
Wawwww. Looks promising. ;)
ReplyDeleteOlivia,
DeleteYes! 'tis quite fun... ;)
I first saw this at a university's theatre when I was little. Those old Errol Flynn movies are so fun and exciting!
ReplyDeleteJohn Smith,
DeleteAgreed! They're so delightful to pull out periodically. Fun and exciting is a great description.
Since my kids love Adventures of Robin Hood, I keep trying to interest them in some of the Flynn/de Havilland pirate movies. They also like pirates. For some reason, they never want to try them. Well, next time it's *me* who has a cold and wants to watch a movie and lie on the couch, guess what I'm pulling out? Totally gonna be this.
ReplyDeleteHamlette,
DeleteOh good! Hee, I'll expect to hear how it turns out. ;D It doesn't have de Havilland, but the other Errol Flynn pirate film I like even better than CB is The Sea Hawk. I reviewed it a few years ago so you should be able to find it on the review page under my header.
Eeep, I so want to see this! I love Olivia de Havilland and Errol Flynn together! <3
ReplyDelete