Prince Valiant (1954)

Director:

Henry Hathaway

Writers:

Hal Foster (comic strip)
Dudley Nichols (screenplay)

Release Date:

5 April 1954 (USA)

Genre:

Adventure

Plot:

Plot Keywords:

Squire | Page Boy Hair Cut | Camelot | Battering Ram | Fall From Height

Cast

James Mason	...	Sir Brack
Janet Leigh	...	Princess Aleta
Robert Wagner	...	Prince Valiant
Debra Paget	...	Ilene
Sterling Hayden	...	Sir Gawain
Victor McLaglen	...	Boltar
Donald Crisp	...	King Aguar
Brian Aherne	...	King Arthur
Barry Jones	...	King Luke
Mary Philips	...	Queen
Howard Wendell	...	Morgan Todd
Tom Conway	...	Sir Kay

Runtime:

100 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.55 : 1

Sound Mix:

4-Track Stereo (Western Electric Recording)

Certification:

UK:U | West Germany:12 (f) | Finland:K-12 | USA:Approved (PCA #16695, General Audience) | Sweden:15

Filming Locations:

Alnwick Castle, Alnwick, Northumberland, England, UK

Company:

Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation

Trivia:

None of the locations were "stock footage" since this was one of the first CinemaScope movies. The locations were shot by a second unit in Britain during the spring and summer of 1953 specifically for this film. Stand-ins doubled for the principal cast in long shots which were then matched at 20th Century-Fox studios and ranch in California during the autumn of 1953. The English stand-in for Janet Leigh's Aleta character was a teenage Shirley Eaton (later to become the James Bond Goldfinger (1964) girl).

Goofs:

Revealing mistakes: As Valiant leaves his castle to meet Boltar at the beginning of the movie, he jumps from several heights to the ground. As Valiant jumps off of a small hill next to the castle, you can clearly see mats falling down from the hill after he jumps.

Quotes:

Sir Gawain: Stop interrupting and I'll tell you what happened. After you left I went out after you. That's when I came upon the black knight.
Prince Valiant: You found him?
Sir Gawain: Aye. He was searchin' the wood when I challenged him. We fought and he was good. His lance broke and I outhorsed him. I came in to finish him, when a dozen armed men came charging out at me.
Prince Valiant: They were on foot? Armed with bows?
Sir Gawain: Aye. It was only with luck I escaped through a hail of arrows.
Prince Valiant: So did I!
Sir Gawain: You what?
Prince Valiant: I was set upon by a band of archers, escaped with an arrow in my back.
Sir Gawain: Where was Sir Brack?
Prince Valiant: I don't know. I was nearly captured where he told me to wait for him. Now he says he went back to find me and found no one. Isn't that strange sir?
[...]

Movie Connections:

Spoofed in Prince Violent (1961)

Could have been worse.

As a Prince Valiant collector and as editor of the Prince Valiant--an American Epic series, I naturally have mixed feelings about this movie. Parts of it are really bad, I know. Hal Foster sent many pages of corrections after he read the script. Naturally, they were ignored. On the other hand, James Mason makes a great villain, and if you kind of squint your eyes during the middle part, the rest of the movie is quite enjoyable. Rick Norwood www.io.com/~norwoodr