Les évasions du capitaine Blood

Having been largely unimpressed by the same director's just-viewed THE LADY AND THE BANDIT (1951), with which it shares stars Louis Hayward and Patricia Medina, I was not exactly enthused by the prospect of watching this – even if its predecessor, FORTUNES OF CAPTAIN BLOOD (1950), had emerged a pleasant surprise; as it turned out, I found myself in agreement with George R. Reis of "DVD Drive-in" who opined that it was actually superior to the 'original' (with which it was paired as an unlikely "Midnite Movie" release!).

Ironically, while the first film (not counting, of course, the unavailable 1924 and the popular 1935 versions) was based on novelist Rafael Sabatini's third adventure featuring the protagonist, this cinematic follow-up is ostensibly an adaptation of the literary tale that preceded it! Anyway, Blood has not only married Isabella (the odd diminutive has been sensibly dropped here) but he has given up piracy and returned to medical practice; still, when we first see him, he is aiding escaped black slaves and, before long, he is dragged back (when a buccaneer takes to impersonating him!) to the sea and the raiding of merchant ships. At one point, Medina tries to intercede on his behalf at court by recounting Blood's earlier enslavement and escape to a life of piracy – illustrated on screen via black-and-white footage from FORTUNES… which, as I said before, had shown Hayward already an established buccaneer!

The busy plot has the hero locking horns with several equally dangerous and untrustworthy figures: a nobleman (John Sutton) with the unfortunate name of Hilary, a trio(!) of other pirate leaders (including Ted de Corsia), and even a heavy-set female innkeeper! Other characters to be featured here are Viceroy Ian Wolfe and, as Medina's gullible uncle, Maltese character actor Sandro Giglio. As for Blood's band of 'merrie men', they seem largely a different bunch than the ones seen in the previous effort(!) – apart from the bearers of the distinctive nationalities I singled out in that film's review. Thankfully, unlike in his previous effort, Blood is only very briefly (and unsuccessfully) tempted by another exotic girl but has to contend instead with Sutton's unrequited attentions to Medina herself!

While, as also mentioned earlier, the colour adds much to the appeal of the movie, it is definitively given an extra edge by full-blooded (pardon the pun) action scenes, especially the ingenious climax as Blood (Hayward having, by now, grown nicely into the part) feigns a defective defense strategy by allowing a number of cannons to be destroyed (while concealing a set of reserves under bushes) and even has his own ship scuttled, so that an approaching enemy vessel ends up wrecked upon its submerged remains! While I will be complementing these two Louis Hayward vehicles with the "Euro-Cult" venture THE SON OF CAPTAIN BLOOD (1962) – starring Errol's real-life offspring, Sean Flynn, no less – I should also point out that I have three more Sabatini-related titles in my unwatched pile, namely the 1924 version of THE SEA HAWK, 1926's BARDELYS THE MAGNIFICENT and the British-made THE PRISONER OF CORBAL, dating from 1936...

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).

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.

Louis Hayward plays Captain Blood, now a reformed character and practicing medicine on a tropical island who wants to settle down and marry a Spanish countess dressed by Jean Louis.

But as regularly happens to Elvis Presley in similar circumstances his past comes back to haunt him and he has to pick up his sword and return to the high seas to restore his reputation.

There's a lot of talk amidst the action; the picture's aspirations to an epic dimension deriving from a brief narration by Patricia Medina. In amongst the yo-ho-ho and swordplay Hayward also gets the admiring attention of a cute little kid who's also just like you'd find in a Presley picture.

Whilst this isn't a patch on "Captain Blood" (1935), it still makes for a fun sort-of sequel with Louis Hayward swashing and buckling for ninety minutes. This time, he must convince the authorities that he is being framed for a series of daring pirate raids on shipping by a man impersonating him. When they try to arrest him, he takes to his old ways to prove his innocence. We have seen all of this before, and to be honest much of it is a bit flat and derivative; Hayward hasn't the glint in his eye of many of his more mischievous, engaging, earlier performances and it really misses a decent baddie - a foil for his character to fence with. It's still an enjoyable film to watch, the costumes are suitably sumptuous and there is cannon fire a-plenty, but somehow it just falls a bit short.