Captain Pirate

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.

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.

This is the latest retelling of the film which made Errol Flynn a star. Louis Heyward plays a convincing Peter Blood, a doctor who becomes a pirate when he is convicted unjustly. I enjoyed the movie when I saw it as a kid. I don't know if I will still like it now. I will have a chance to see it again as Sony MGM is planning to release it on DVD on June 27, 2006 as a double program with "Fortunes of Captain Blood". "Captain Pirate" is a loose remake of "Fortunes..." made 2 years later again starring Heyward as Blood and in color this time and written by the same screen writers, Frank Burt and Robert Libott. However, at that time, I found "Fortunes..." to be a better film. Now I'll be able to judge them when the DVD comes out. By the way, my favorite pirate movie of all time, then and now, is still "The Crimson Pirate" with Burt Lancaster.

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.

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 of a cute little kid who's also just like you'd find in a Presley picture.