Robin des Bois don juan

Robin Hood is dead but his merry men need a new hero to take on the baton and save England.

This is a nonsensical but nevertheless at times mildly entertaining adventure. It looks low budget and the script is average to say the least. On the plus side the acting is passable and to be honest the cast at least look like they are enjoying themselves. David Hedison makes for a good looking hero as he takes on the mantle of Robin Hoods son.

The fight scenes are a bit clumsy and it all becomes a bit repetitive but it just about manages to hold your attention till the predictable end. This is a film that doesn't take itself seriously which is just as well.

The Son of Robin Hood is a very average adventure but a good natured one. This is a watchable film but you'll forgot it ten minutes after seeing it.

This lovely little Saturday full-length feature was filmed during the heyday of Robin Hood spin-offs, and it was apparent that the producers and directors spared almost every expense to maximize what little profit their copy-cat production was likely to make. The acting was wooden and artificial, the stunts (fights, etc.) appeared as though the actors had only received their choreo the day before filming. The casting was obscure, with only David Hedison (who has no command of the English accent whatsoever) and George Coulouris being the only familiar names in the cast. It was difficult to identify the direction, too. Other than those items, the film was a bit like a train wreck -- difficult to tear one's eyes away from. It's very unfortunate that the cast and the director played the entire film straight and took themselves seriously. This could have been a delightful comedy had there been the knowing look, the wink, the nudge, the glance toward the 4th wall from time to time to keep the audience engaged. I rated this one 4 stars b/c of the train-wreck nature of the film ... I just couldn't look away for fear I'd miss something positive.

Back when I was a lad the Son Of Robin Hood played as the second feature to some other Fox film on a double bill. Occasionally those second features were something worthwhile even better than the A film they accompanied. This film was definitely not in that category.

It's been some 20 years since the Merry Men got disbanded and they're now middle-aged and somewhat gone to seed. But with the death of King John there's a plot afoot to steal the throne by an evil duke played by David Farrar. The rightful heir Marius Goring has been imprisoned by Farrar, but Goring has a brother in David Hedison who will set things right in the Douglas Fairbanks/Errol Flynn tradition, not.

You have to have a certain elan to do swashbucklers. Either you have it or you don't. David Hedison best known for being the Captain of the Seaview on the TV series Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea just ain't got it. Also his American speech pattern with the British cast sounds jarringly out of place. What worked for Clark Gable in Mutiny On The Bounty doesn't work for Hedison. Then again Mutiny On The Bounty was a much better film, like light years better.

Added to that none of the historical characters vying for the throne ever existed. Including Robin Hood or in this case the late Robin Hood. Turns out he died some ten years than the events of this film and he left a daughter June Laverick. She does fill out that Lincoln green suit all right. But she's a girl and those aged Merry Men ain't about to come out of retirement for her.

They do for Hedison though as the faux son of Robin Hood and of course the inevitable does happen.

Maybe the worst Robin Hood film ever done.

And neither is the beginning or the middle as the story of Robin Hood gets the AT SWORDS' POINT treatment, with a bunch of little-known actors -- except for George Couloris, David Farrar and Marius Goring -- under the direction of George Sherman, who spent most of his career, properly, directing B westerns.

June Laverick, a pretty young blonde, plays the daughter of Robin Hood, who spends most of her time hiding behind David 'Al' Hedison, who pretends to be her -- him -- that is, Robin Hood's son, leading Robin's old and graying Merry Men. The whole thing is directed with little of the silliness that attended AT SWORDS' POINT, but the whole thing is handsomely shot in wide screen. Unhappily, the prints were definitely not Technicolor, but have aged poorly, casting a gloomy and pink sheen over the entire proceedings. The score is also a nice variation on Korngold's score for the Errol Flynn version. You can skip this one.

SON OF ROBIN HOOD is a cheapjack addition to the Robin Hood franchise which, despite plentiful action sequences, is largely a somewhat laughable viewing experience and more often than not a bore. The film is set some twenty years after the Robin Hood story and sees David Hedison adopting the moniker of the son of Robin Hood, even though he's actually not; Hood's offspring was a daughter, not a son.

Confused yet? It doesn't really matter. There's a girl to romance, some hijinks to be had in Sherwood Forest, and a Sheriff of Nottingham-alike and his men to fight and pierce with arrows. This film looks and feels very cheap with cardboard walls, painted backgrounds, and a general fake feel. I was surprised to see that it was made in England as it has more of a stylised, fantasy Hollywood feel and is no patch on the similar, more grounded efforts that Hammer put out around the same time such as THE SWORD OF SHERWOOD FOREST.

Hedison never really convinces as an outlaw hero and it's fair to say that the majority of the cast members simply go through the motions. The only one I really liked was George Woodbridge, who makes a decent stab at the character of Little John. Marius Goring and George Coulouris show up in support too. The direction is very poor with plenty of continuity errors and the like which constantly distract the viewer, although the climactic sword fight isn't bad in a "let's rip off THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD" type way.