Black Swan, The (1942)
Director: Henry King
Starring: Tyrone Power, Maureen O’Hara
Honors:
Even as World War II raged on Hollywood and its audiences
were still in wanting of a big screen spectacle. Here Tyrone Power takes us on
a high seas adventure to the time of pirates as they pillaged the Spanish Main
providing views of swashbuckling action in bright and beautiful Technicolor.
This motion picture would contain many of the classic pirate themes and locales
to fill one’s adventurous needs. The film captures the danger and romance of
the seas with the exhibition of a few of industry’s most eye catching tactics
exhilarating audiences of the 1940s.
The Black Swan is
an adventurous swashbuckling tale of a pirate captain torn between the idea of
reforming from his life’s work of plundering when a beautiful woman enters his
life. In the legendary days when pirates roamed the waters of the Caribbean one
legendary pirate, Captain Henry Morgan (Laird Cregar) is appointed to govern
the island colony of Jamaica for the British crown and bring an end to the
plundering within the surrounding waters. Captain Jaime Waring (Tyrone Power),
also a devilish pirate, is appointed to reform and become Morgan’s lieutenant
sent to seek out and stop one of his fellow buccaneers Captain Billy Leech
(George Sanders) of the “Black Swan”, one who refused to turn on his
brotherhood of pirates. Along the way Waring takes a liking to Lady Margaret
(Maureen O’Hara), the daughter of Jamaica’s former governor, going as far as to
kidnap her to keep her from marrying one of English nobilty.
Warning attempts to infiltrate Leech’s ranks stating he is
not a turncoat to the pirate brethren, all with the unwilling Margaret in tow.
Morgan is excommunicated from his governorship due to his immediate failure to
stop Leech, but the rift has already been created between the pirates. In true
swashbuckling style a spectacular battle ensues where Waring defeats Leech and
gets the girl in when Margaret proves to be much strong than she sems.
From a contemporary point of view this feature has all the
clichés that may make one dislike this picture greatly. It consists fo the usual
British pirates fighting against Spanish colonies. There are plenty of “arh’s”
and “matey’s” to go around. Swashbuckling sword fighting adorns the action
sequences, but is nothing more than flailing around blades in front of
untrained actors with the addition of plenty clanging sounds. The love story
never really makes sense as as the picture rolls on. Waring basically takes
Margaret and threatens to rape her, laughs in her face while she attempts to
fight him off. Along with kidnapping her, there is no sense in understanding
how this swoons a beautiful, young lady into one day falling in love with this
supposed brut.
There is so much one can look back on in this picture and
just despise, but here we will attempt to look at it through the glasses of an
audience from 1942/3 who were just beholding for a motion picture spectacle to
take them on a trip away from the world by way of the movie theater.
 |
| The Black Swan |
Originally the feature was a planned adaptation of the novel
of the same name by Rafael Sabatini, but quickly that idea turned into a
completely original story. Only the historical figure Captain Henry Morgan remained
as the last remnant of the source material. The first thing that would have
grabbed the attention of the movie going audience of the time was that it was
produced in glorious Technicolor. This very costly process was a rare sight due
to war fractioning off most of the international markets, cutting into possible
box office profits. Along with Technicolor comes the usual bright, elaborate
costuming and equally extravagant sets, all adding to a budget motion pictures
at the time would attempt to keep manageable.
To aid in cutting cost of the production director Henry King
was able to keep shots done to a minimum, usually getting what he wanted from
the actors in the first or second takes. This limited the need of extra film
stock and allowed for production to move as quickly as possible. After all,
time is money in the movies. King’s experience on various period piece films in
the past allowed him to feel comfortable to get what he wanted on camera in an
efficient manner, which was what 20th Century-Fox was looking for
from this veteran filmmaker.
Despite the film’s spectacle scope the main cast was small
in size, occupied with actors with notable careers. Tyrone Power headlines the
picture, performing in a manner only the likes of Errol Flynn, or perhaps Douglas
Fairbanks of an earlier generation, could have given. Appearing numerous moments
bare-chested, he provides enough physicality to be believable as a pirate of
the high seas. His co-star and love interest is played by Maureen O’Hara, an
Irish born actress who had moved to America at the unset of war in Europe. Her
recent work had seen her land in adventure pictures which increased her
notoriety within the industry at this time, but here gives a performance that
is a bit stiff and lacking of complexity.
 |
| Laird Cregar (left) as Captain Morgan. |
The supporting cast each brought a notable flare to the
feature. Laird Cregar as Henry Morgan brings with his a presence of a man with
a booming voice commanding the attention of his fellow buccaneers. The former
Academy Award winner Thomas Mitchell portrays primarily the film’s comic relief
as Tyrone Power’s right hand man, always the one looking for a drink and
spouting off the cliché pirate one-liners. George Sanders is near
unrecognizable as Captain Leech, the villain of the picture, behind that big
red beard of his. Usually one to play an English gentleman, Sanders portrays an
interesting new range in his acting skill despite being an overly stereotyped,
B-movie style pirate character. At his side is Anthony Quinn as Wogan. Quinn’s
performance is neither memorable, nor significant, but it does manifest his
growing number of screen credits recently in his career for a man that would
one day be a major screen star.
What the picture set out to do is what it would achieve, a
major Hollywood spectacle. It had everything a Hollywood swashbuckling movie
ever wanted at that time, big sets, action, adventure, booming cannons, sword
fights, and a dash of a love story. The
film would please most audiences, but a handful of critics would be able to
look past the lavishness and bright colors to note the lacking plot and the
poor acting, deficient of dimensionality.
 |
| George Sanders as Leech |
The Black Swan
remains a perfect example of the pirate based movies of the time and would
inspire other such films even decades later. The feature was nominated for
three Academy Awards, coming away with the prize for Best Cinematography for a
color feature, proving sometimes all stduios needed was to produce a large
color feature to win a prize from the Academy in this case. The film delighted
audiences of the time and in effort to extract more money from audiences would
later be re-released with black and white as a cheap reissuing year later.
Not much can be stated about a legacy of the feature as it
would generally fade into the background of an industry whose future contained
better achievements in special effects in the coming years. The Black Swan continues to delight
Tyrone Power admirers and fans of classic Hollywood swashbuckling pictures, but
much like the stories of real pirates this feature just pass along as quickly
in the night.
.jpg)
Comments
Post a Comment