Les évasions du capitaine Blood

LOUIS HAYWARD was born to play the lead in swashbuckler movies like this one; and 60 years ago when he did movies in modern clothes the public wished he was in a movie like this one.

A well made action adventure which relies heavily on character and story -- and less on today's annoying jump-around camera "work" and editing -- without the silliness of Jerry Bruckheimer and Johnny Depp -- this was what pirate movies were all about.

One thing about CAPTAIN PIRATE is the slavery thing which is not the main focus but is a vital part of the story. The slaves were in Jamaica, and in Martinique, and Santo Domingo, and a lot of other places. England, Spain, Netherlands, France; they all enjoyed the benefits of "live gold" -- but kept their slaves out-of-sight in the Caribbean (and other places). America was the country that ENDED slavery; but all the same we hear bellyaching about it 150 years later -- not just from Blacks but from white liberals and their endless hand-wringing "White Guilt" -- even though nobody's been a slave or owned a slave in a century-and-a-half. Captain Blood did NOT like slavery -- most particularly since he was an ex-slave (oh, yes; white slaves too).

This fine movie, as well as the earlier "Fortunes of Captain Blood" are available on DVD. I recommend both. Or either.

Yes, folks, the producer of this marvelous little adventure yarn is the same who gave us the Budd Boetticher and Randolph Scott's western series, several years later. I am so happy that it was not the infamous Sam Katzman who produced this excellent movie. Because the poor Ralph Murphy - lame director - could have done anything against this Katzman plague; even William Castle hardly tried his best, during his Columbia Pictures period, with Katzman on his back, watching over his shoulder. Without any success.... So, yes, this tremendous adventure film, very colorful, action packed, is as good as the Sidney Salkow's films or even the Universal Studios ones, also from the same period, starring the likes of Maureen O'Hara insteand of Patricia Medina - O'Hara's equivalent for Harry Cohn's company (Columbia).

Harry Cohn must have wanted to do Captain Pirate and it's predecessor Fortunes of Captain Blood very bad because he had to have shelved out some big bucks to Jack Warner for that footage he used in a flashback sequence in this film. Might have been interesting had he gotten Errol Flynn along with the movie.

Not that Louis Hayward is a bad Captain Blood. Hayward definitely has the swashbuckling élan for the part. But he's up against a rather routine script that's concerned with a case of identity theft.

Somewhere along the line Blood ditched the Olivia DeHavilland character from the Warner Brothers classic and in the Fortunes Of Captain Blood wooed and won the daughter of Spanish don, Patricia Medina. Now wedding bells are ringing, but when one of His Majesty's representatives, John Sutton, who also has a hankering for Pat brings news that Blood has led a raid on Cartagena and among other things stolen some valuable jewelry, it looks like Hayward is back to his old pirate ways.

In fact that becomes something of a wish fulfillment for Sutton, because Hayward in order to prove his innocence has to round up his old crew and steal a ship, Sutton's ship to be precise, and roam the Caribbean in search of the impostor. During the search he uncovers some treason as well. Great Britain and Spain were allies at this time during the 1690s and the French would like nothing better than to tear this alliance apart.

Hayward and Medina make a beautiful pair of hero and heroine. Hayward's Blood is not as dashing as Errol Flynn's, but he does make up for it with being very cunning. Still the results are rather predictable and if you haven't figured out who the bad guys are, you haven't seen too many pirate movies.

I guess the previous reviews have said most of it. I watched this film without having seen "Fortunes of Captain Blood", and it was OK. Good colour, and the battle scenes, including the inevitable closing duel, were well mounted, if one makes allowances for model ships devoid of crews.

The plot progressed at a good pace, though there were several occasions when I thought "How on earth did (s)he know that", and the King of Spain's offer of a pardon for Dona Isabella arrived very quickly indeed.

There was quite a parade of colourful characters who had a few minutes of screen time.

One shouldnt miss this or its kind, because it's a pirate film we have very few of them these days,and if any,they are so bad as Cutthroat Island. I dont remember very well,but its a well made program picture,and much fun to see.