Like all Ulmer's films, it gives the impression of a somewhat haphazard shooting all the way, the characters being rather superficial and not all of them convincing enough (the chief of police is totally out of place, acting only with artifice,) while the cinematography is overwhelmingly well carried out and the most professional element of the film. To this comes Nino Rota's slightly Pucciniesque music giving everything an extra lustre, and it is all filmed on location in the most romantic surroundings of Naples and Capri, with almost only Italian actors except Hayward and Bonnie Barnes, the queen. The story is the revolution of Naples around 1800 when the old royal house was disposed of, Louis Hayward leading the rebellion as the Queen's favourite but acting also as a masked leader of the rebels, he gives a good show all the way, and there are some comical instances as well. Naturally you wait through the entire film for the final settlement between the tyrannous police chief and Hayward, and of course it takes appropriate place in the finale. The whole set-up and action is like a classical Italian opera by Verdi or Puccini, and Nino Rota's music closely relates to that tradition. It is a great swashbuckler entertainment in the tradition of Fairbanks and Errol Flynn, who couldn't have done it better.
Review of The Pirates of Capri
The Pirates of Capri
(1949)
The liberation of Naples from the oppression and intrigues of a Scarpian police
19 September 2023