Now Over 5500 Reviews and (near) Daily Updates!

WELCOME! Use the search engines on this site (or your own off-site engine of choice) to gain easy access to the complete MAKSQUIBS Archive; more than 5500 posts and counting. (New posts added every day or so.)

You can check on all our titles by typing the Title, Director, Actor or 'Keyword' you're looking for in the Search Engine of your choice (include the phrase MAKSQUIBS) or just use the BLOGSPOT.com Search Box at the top left corner of the page.

Feel free to place comments directly on any of the film posts and to test your film knowledge with the CONTESTS scattered here & there. (Hey! No Googling allowed. They're pretty easy.)

Send E-mails to MAKSQUIBS@yahoo.com . (Let us know if the TRANSLATE WIDGET works!) Or use the Profile Page or Comments link for contact.

Thanks for stopping by.

Friday, November 6, 2020

THE BLACK ROSE (1950)

Double-dipping on semi-literate historical adventure, Darryl F. Zanuck kept Tyrone Power & Orson Welles working on location in Europe, but switched from b&w for the Renaissance Italy of PRINCE OF FOXES to TechniColor 13th Century England (and the Far East) on ROSE.  The earlier pic, directed by Henry King, used more Hollywood tech & talent, while Henry Hathaway used Brits.  To his advantage in cinematographer Jack Cardiff, lighting with painterly style unusual for 20th/Fox at the time*; less so in Richard Addinsell’s unmemorable score.  ROSE does have the stronger supporting cast (Jack Hawkins, Michael Rennie, Finlay Currie, Robert Blake, James Robertson Justice) while both films strike-out on their respective female leads.  Here, Cécile Aubry (a caravan hostage for Power to save & fall for) is less minx than French chipmunk.  (In her big love confession she suddenly looks like Judy Garland, of all people!  Prominent forehead, wide-spaced puppet-like doe-eyes, thick lower lip for chewing on.)  If only the story were half as involving as FOXES.  Alas, no match for Borgia intrigue here as Power’s near-noble Saxon (he’s illegitimate) leaves Norman England in a huff to seek fortune in far off ‘Cathay,’ making like Marco Polo with Jack Hawkins as sidekick.  Welles, jobbing to raise cash for his stunning version of OTHELLO/'52, has a fine time behind ‘Oriental’ makeup and a more ambivalent role than he had in FOXES, this film's natural DOUBLE-BILL.

Another DOUBLE-BILL: Director Hathaway playfully sends up the whole genre in PRINCE VALIANT/’54.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *Color & crispness spectacularly raised in HD remastering.

No comments: