JohnHowardReid
NOTES: Originally it was intended to remake the 1924 version of Sabatini's novel. Delmer Daves prepared a script. However, this idea was scrapped. Instead an original screenplay, "Beggars of the Sea", by Seton I. Miller, revised by Howard Koch, was used. (This was Koch's first screenplay. He had signed with Warners on the strength of his sensational radio script for "War of the Worlds".)In the climactic sword duel, Flynn was doubled by Don Turner and Henry Daniell by both Ned Davenport and Ralph Faulkner. Negative cost: $1,700,000.
Shooting commenced 1 February 1940 and took 68 days (20 behind schedule), finishing 19 April 1940.Nominated for the following Academy Awards: Art Direction (black-and-white), Sound, Music Score, and Special Effects. (These awards were respectively won by Pride and Prejudice, Strike Up the Band, Tin Pan Alley and The Thief of Bagdad.)COMMENT: Arguably the best of Flynn's swashbucklers, The Sea Hawk is an ingratiatingly acted, superbly paced and marvelously expensive tale, embellished by Curtiz's forceful direction, Polito's stunning photography and Korngold's rousing, welcomely intrusive score. Money has been spent like pirate gold on extras, costumes and sets. Even without knowing the budget, it's obvious the film has been realized with enormous care and craftsmanship.Flynn makes a gentlemanly Thorpe. His scenes with Robson have an unusual and special flavor, a delightful parrying which producer Wallis did not appreciate because these lines were adlibbed by Koch, Flynn and Curtiz on the set. Wallis hated tinkering with the script and also tried to hold back the director's constant attentions to the fight and action scenes. In both respects, he was unsuccessful. Curtiz's varied camera set-ups with their strikingly in-depth compositions and his dramatically inventive angles (the thrilling overhead pan along the deserted ship as Flynn and his buckos climb back aboard) lend the whole film a wonderful atmosphere of high-spirited derring-do and romantic excitement.Fortunately the love interest doesn't get in the way of the lavishly-staged action. No wonder Olivia de Havilland turned the part down! Newcomer Brenda Marshall (she had made only one previous film: Espionage Agent) was assigned. She's capable enough but lacks charisma and color. Nonetheless, this role was probably the high point of her career. (In real life, she married William Holden in 1941, retired from pictures in 1943, made a brief comeback in 1949 and 1950.)Due to Curtiz's skill, none of the film's production problems show up on the screen. Henry Daniell was reportedly "absolutely helpless" with a sword. He is obviously doubled in the long shots, but the close-ups are quite effective and that is Flynn himself the double is often dueling! With that sonorously evil voice of his, Daniell really makes a marvelous villain, completely wiping the floor with poor old Donald Crisp (whose part is pretty small to boot). His co-conspirator, the satanically costumed Claude Rains, also has a high time, while Francis McDonald likewise shines as a properly slimy henchman.Alan Hale and Una O'Connor reprise their usual sidekick roles, William Lundigan (later to become a rather dreary if minor leading man) is reasonably effective in a small spot as one of Thorpe's crew (a group which includes a meatier characterization for J.M. Kerrigan and a surprisingly piddling bit for Edgar Buchanan). Gilbert Roland's role is also not over-large, though it's important enough to give us a sense of disappointment that his acting is slightly wooden. Among the character players, Halliwell Hobbes and particularly Alec Craig deserve our full admiration.It's interesting that some of the cleverly effective directorial touches we remember from the film (the close-up of the spinning globe with Hobbes' voice off-camera) turn out from an examination of the written screenplay to be Koch's devices not Curtiz's. Yet Curtiz alone embell¬ished the scene on the deserted ship with that stunningly dramatic overhead shot. What is more, Curtiz (and Korngold) have given the whole scene much greater atmosphere (and length). Our only complaint with his direction is that very occasionally he falls back on old-fashioned tricks like speeding up the action by under-cranking the camera. These obvious lurks date the film and actually lessen its impact. Fortunately, there are few of them. The miniature ships are maybe just a tiny bit obvious too, though quick cutting helps their disguise. A few snips of "old" stock footage are also thrown into relief by Polito's superbly contrasted "new" photography.Quibbles aside, The Sea Hawk is one of the great sea-sword-and-cannon entertainments of the cinema. Basil Rathbone fans were naturally disappointed their champion (who was incidentally first choice for the role) somehow missed out on Wolfingham, but Daniell's impersonation in my opinion is equally enthralling. As for the broodingly atmospheric sets, the edge-of-the-seat film editing (e.g. the intricate intercutting between Marshall and Flynn in the sequence in which she misses the sailing of "The Albatross"), and the dazzling panache of Curtiz's direction, who would deny (or forego) such excitement? The Sea Hawk's appeal is the same as Robin Hood's or Captain Blood's: White is right. The dashing spirit of romance and adventure is seen to triumph splendidly over all the machinations of enemy and fate.Acted with enthusiasm and realized on the grandest of scales, The Sea Hawk is a masterpiece of cinematic enchantment.
dwpollar
1st watched 1/22/2017,(Dir-Michael Curtiz): Engaging action movie about one Sea Hawk ship, named Albatross, from a fleet working for the English, but not truly commissioned by them. Yes, they are good Pirates!! Errol Flynn plays the captain of the Albatross, who independently trolls the English sea's protecting the country from invaders and those against the Queen. The Spanish are the enemies in this movie as they attempt to take over the world and feel like England is in the way. The Albatross's first capture is of a Spanish ship in the English channel that had English prisoners in the galley manually rowing the huge vessel. A good deed in their eyes, but because one of the passengers was a Spanish ambassador on the way to visit with the Queen -- they were not happy. This is the premise setting up a swashbuckler adventure scanning from England to Panama and back again eventually. The crew of the Albatross, including Alan Hale(The Skipper from Gilligan's Island's dad), are captured and eventually are sent to the galleys as well, but the Captain will not let things stay this way. This movie was much more in-depth than I expected it to be -- with more of an epic feel, and the romance was downplayed letting the action take center stage. An unexpected gem for this early action film with the usually good Michael Curtiz taking the helm, and the appealing Error Flynn holding the fort.
Edgar Allan Pooh
. . . requires a different skill set than winning a beauty pageant. Helen Mirren is typecast as the present Queen Elizabeth, and Cate Blanchett made her career playing the first one. Michelle Pfeiffer has not portrayed either Elizabeth on screen. Ms. Blanchett has been cast as Bob Dylan, and I think that Ms. Mirren played a dude in RED or RED 2. Flora Robson certainly fits the mannish Elizabethan mold as the British monarch in THE SEA HAWK. One of the few facts about QEI that I remember from my school days is that she died NOT with her boots on, but with an INCH of make-up caked up over the decades on her face. Since the current queen has now lived far longer than her namesake, getting up close and personal with her is quite a frightening thought. One of the main things I've learned about English law and cuisine is that only the queen can eat swans. I see swans daily near my home, and more often than not, I half expect to see QEII emerge from the bushes and come running after them with a bib tied around her neck, fork and knife in hand!
writers_reign
This is yet another vintage film that I'm only just catching up with, some 70 years after its initial release and this probably has a lot to do with how indifferent I feel about it. Whilst I've always found Errol Flynn charming with great charisma I sensed a strain on both here. Brenda Marshall is wooden in the extreme and there is absolutely no chemistry between her and Flynn. Claude Rains, too, seems oddly ill-at-ease possibly because unlike his Captain Renault in Casablanca he is not permitted to display the impish side of his character and come on as more of a lovable rogue than black-as-night villain. Even the swordplay was lacklustre and it's too easy to say that Henry Daniell is a poor substitute for Basil Rathbone. I've given it five out of ten whereas had I seen it earlier I may have gone to seven or eight.
