1938’s The Adventures of Robin Hood starring Errol Flynn is my favorite movie of all time and I’ve seen a lot of Robin Hood films over the years. None have lived up to that 1938 classic. Those made in the past 30 years have been downright terrible. I’ve known about the silent Douglas Fairbanks version for a long time but never had the chance to see it. I now seen it (at least a version of it) and found it to be half of a very entertaining movie. It takes an hour for “The Earl of Huntingdon” to take up the moniker of Robin Hood, who steals from the rich and gives to the poor.
This telling of the story of Robin Hood begins with The Earl of Huntingdon (Douglas Fairbanks) in a jousting match with Sir Guy of Gisbourne (Paul Dickey). After winning the match King Richard (Wallace Beery) tells Huntingdon to receive his award from the Lady Marian Fitzwalter (Enid Bennett), who the slimy Gisbourne is smitten by. They hit is off. This all leads up to Richard, Huntingdon, and Gisbourne departing to fight in the Crusades, leaving the power-crazed younger brother of Richard- Prince John (Sam De Grasse) in charge. While the good King Richard is away, John and his cronies begin to tax the people of England into destitution and punish those who cannot pay. Marian speaks out about what is going on, then must flee into the forest after Prince John sets his men to capture her. She sends a message to Huntington, still fighting in the Crusades, telling him to return and help end Prince John’s rule of cruelty. So he does. Finding the land and his people in tatters he takes up the visage of the Bandit king to fight back against Prince John’s reign. It all comes to a head when John learns the location of Robin Hood’s forest hide-out and sends his army to destroy them. With his army gone, Robin takes this opportunity to retake the town and bring down Prince John. At the same time Richard returns and joins Robin’s men in retaking the kingdom. You know the rest.
As I said before it takes a full hour before Douglas Fairbanks becomes Robin Hood and does what Fairbanks was known for- crazy stunts and action scenes. I had a hard time getting through that first hour. It’s a slog. Imagine Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves if the first hour was Kevin Costner in a tent in the war talking and Prince John taxing and mistreating the people of the kingdom? After that original jousting scene the movie just drags until Fairbanks finally takes up the mantle of Robin Hood and the fun, finally begins. So now the movie is half over and it just starts to get going. Once it gets going it’s a lot of fun. Fairbanks jumps around, climbs walls, slides down curtains, and leaps from peak to peak. The usual stuff for him. He comes alive in the personage of Robin Hood. His Little John, interestingly enough, is played by Alan Hale who also played Little John to Errol Flynn’s Robin Hood.
The staging is pretty standard for the time. No moving cameras and I don’t believe I saw even a pan. The cameras were “locked off” so all the action had to be contained in the frame. In 1922 very few people were experimenting with these types of uses of the camera. They were very large and difficult to move and this movie was a big budget affair, with enormous sets and period costumes. Douglas Fairbanks, who’s production company was making the film, did not have time or cash to experiment. He knew what his audience wanted and he was going to deliver. Arguably he’d peak with The Thief of Bagdad two years later, but Robin Hood does deliver the action. Once you get past that first hour. Robin Hood was a hit and played at the famous Egyptian Theater in Los Angeles so long that the street car conductors, instead of announcing the stop near the theater by street would say “All out for Robin Hood!”
Long time collaborator, director Allan Dwan, had already worked with Douglas Fairbanks 10 times and they would work together on 1929’s The Iron Mask and their only “talky”, Chances, in 1931. Dwan continued to find success into the 1950s with his best films coming in the 30’s and 40’s. Movies like Heidi with Shirley Temple, The Three Musketeers with Don Ameche, Brewster’s Millions, and Sands of Iwo Jima with John Wayne. Douglas Fairbanks was known best for his adventure pictures that featured his own stunt work. He, along with wife Mary Pickford, Charlie Chaplin, and DW Griffith formed their own production company- United Artists in 1911, to get out from under the thumbs of the newly forming big Studios. He retired from acting in 1934 after the release of his final film, The Private Life of Don Juan. Fairbanks died in 1939 of a heart attack. It is said his last words were “I’ve never felt better in my life.”
The version of Robin Hood I saw was not the ideal version. It runs two hours and the music accompaniment is standard piano songs of the time, including “The Entertainer”. I know there is a version that is longer and features better music and colored scenes. I’d love to see it, but can’t imagine it being any longer. I can only hope the extra footage is from the second half of the film.
I watched Robin Hood streamed on Amazon Prime, but is available on home video with DVD released ranging from $8 to $30. The $30 dollar release is a blu-ray double feature with Fairbanks’ Black Pirate. Both films “restored” versions.
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