Swashbuckler
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Actor: Beau Bridges, Geneviève Bujold, James Earl Jones, Peter Boyle, Robert ShawBrand: Universal Studios
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono; English (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono; French (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono
Format: Anamorphic, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, Live, NTSC, Widescreen
Picture Format: 2.35:1
Running Time: 101 minutes
DVD Release Date: 1999-01-05
Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Studio: Universal Studios
DVD Reviews of Swashbuckler
DVD Review: More a disappointment than a disaster
Summary: 3 Stars
In the scathing but short-lived satire of amoral movie producers, Action!, the first and most important thing uberproducer Peter Dragon teaches his daughter is "No pirate movies." Certainly before Pirates of the Caribbean finally broke the curse, the industry was littered with the sporadic wrecks left by those few foolhardy producers who would try at least once a decade to revive the genre only to end up with costly disasters like the rival 1982 versions of The Pirates of Penzance, Roman Polanski's Pirates or Renny Harlin's Cutthroat Island. 1976's The Scarlet Buccaneer (aka Swashbuckler) is certainly no exception to the rule. It even has a pirate called Polanski in it.
On paper it has everything it needs for an enjoyable romp but on screen it doesn't make the most of the hand it's been dealt. The script is more than serviceable, there's no shortage of talent among the cast - Robert Shaw, Genevieve Bujold, James Earl Jones, Geoffrey Holder and Peter Boyle - though none are at their best, the Mexican locations are good, Philip Lathrop's scope photography pleasing, The Golden Hinde, the full scale replica of Sir Francis Drake's ship, earns its own above-the-titles screen credit as the kind of galleon any pirate would be proud to command and John Addison's infectiously easygoing score is a treat. Yet as Ned Lynch and the men of his Blarney Cock (it's the name of his ship, and at one time the working title for the film) free the poor people of Jamaica from its corrupt and tyrannical "English" governor you get the distinct impression that while most of the cast had fun making it, it's not particularly infectious, translating more as laziness than a good time had by all.
Shaw may have made his name as a pirate in the low-budget 50s children's adventure series The Buccaneers but as a big screen buccaneer he might have his moments but often lacks lustre. It doesn't help that at times he seems to be modelling the hero on both Albert and Harold Steptoe rather than Burt Lancaster or Errol Flynn. He's also rather visibly a little worse for wear in the finale when a sudden turn very obviously leaves him unsteady on his feet after what you suspect was a long liquid lunch. Still, Genevieve Bujold makes a fine and rather gorgeous heroine, throwing in some gratuitous nudity for good measure (how times have changed: at the time the studio were so worried she might look underweight they put her on a diet of double-helpings to pad her out!).
Holder and Jones overdo it mightily, though neither can compare to Beau Bridges, who displays all the lightness of touch of a stampeding elephant in tap shoes, possessed of the curious delusion that the LOUDER and slllooowwweeerrr he shouts the funnier his lines become. Even Gordon Brown has better comic timing. But the film's biggest problem is the pantomime villain, with Peter Boyle's corrupt and perverted governor so staggeringly hammy and unmenacing that the only ones with anything to fear from him are Jewish cannibals. Spending most of his screen time going through a personal grooming routine or playing with toy boats in the bath with his toy boy while a silent Angelica Huston lurks on the sidelines, he's a less convincing adversary than he is a persistent irritant who all but holes the film below the waterline every time he appears.
With no English actors but Shaw in the cast there are plenty of bad accents on display, the initially clumsy editing does little to disguise the under-rehearsed action scenes and poor swordsmanship, yet somehow despite everything the film somehow manages to right itself enough to improve a lot around the halfway point as it starts to get the tone right and there's finally some real fun to be had. The result is more a disappointment than a disaster, but still a modestly entertaining one if you dial down your expectations.
The Region 1 DVD is a disappointing disc, but those with multi-region players might want to seek out the English-friendly German PAL DVD, which includes trailer, a making of featurette from the film's release, stills gallery and even a 16-minute Super 8mm cutdown version of the film!
Description of Swashbuckler
SWASHBUCKLER - DVD MoviePractically a nonstop brawl between pirates and anybody who gets in their path, this lighthearted, high-energy 1976 movie set in 18th century Jamaica is short on an actual story but thick with stunts and swordplay. Robert Shaw stars as the bawdy, swaggering pirate Red Nel Lynch, whose lusty crew of thieves comes to the aid of Lynch's right-hand man and close pal (James Earl Jones), then helps a beleaguered noblewoman (Genevieve Bujold) whose father and property have been seized by a local tyrant (Peter Boyle). Plot details are pretty much relegated to filling in the spaces between rollicking scenes of flying fists and gleaming blades, and a sort-of love story between Shaw and Bujold never gets the chance to go anywhere for all the orchestrated scuffling. Boyle's performance as a Basil Rathbone-style villain has got to be the least persuasive role of his career, but there are compensations, particularly Bujold's feisty turn as the heroine and a kooky scene in which Shaw and Jones amuse each other by trading dirty limericks. Directed by James Goldstone (Winning). The DVD release includes production notes, cast and filmmakers' bios, a theatrical trailer, and Web links. --Tom Keogh
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