I’m pretty sure I saw 1951’s Captain Horatio Hornblower on television when I was a kid but hadn’t seen it since. It’s a pretty entertaining film, though some aspects haven’t aged well. Luckily, the story and performances of the leads keep your interest, even when something not culturally appropriate today hits the screen. The film takes elements from three of the Hornblower novels by C.S. Forester- The Happy Return, Ship of the Line, and Flying Colours, giving the movie a bit of an episodic feel. We begin with Gregory Peck’s Hornblower and his crew having traveled to the western coast of Central America to arm a local despot who has agreed to align his kingdom with the English against the Spanish, who the English are at war with. Things go a little sideways when Hornblower is informed, a little too late, that the English are now teaming up with Spain against France, ruled by Napoleon. At that time, he is also forced to bring a woman aboard who has been evacuated from Panama who turns out to be the fiancé of another big wig in his majesty’s navy. After returning to England Hornblower and his crew are sent to join the fight with France. After a great battle Hornblower and his crew are captured. He and a couple of his compatriots are sent to Paris for trial. They escape and wind up posing as Dutch officers to find their way home again.
Once you get over the fact that Gregory Peck, along with a couple more actors, made no effort to speak with an English accent and just let the film happen, it really is quite fun. When we first meet Hornblower and his crew, close to mutinying, they have been stuck for over a week at sea with no wind and their food and water supply is soon to be used up. After a gamble by the captain to go one more day pays off with wind that allows them to reach their destination just in time. His crew turn around and are firmly behind their captain and ready to follow him to the end. I liked that earning the respect of the crew being portrayed before any action happens. We also are introduced to a few key members of the crew who we will follow-- his second in command Lt. Bush (Robert Beatty), James Kenney (young Midshipman Longley), and ship’s blacksmith Seaman Quist (James R. Justice). Each have important moments in the film and having had the opportunity to know more about them delivers more of an emotional punch than they could have. Virginia Mayo plays Lady Wellesly, the woman Hornblower is forced to take aboard and deliver back to England. She had been mostly known for musical and romantic comedies with people like Danny Kaye before this film. After this she mostly worked in action costume dramas. Just prior this film she was in White Heat, with James Cagney, directed by Raoul Walsh, who also directed Captain Horatio Hornblower. He was mostly known for westerns, comedies, and gangster films which I think helped him in Hornblower. There are light moments that work very well and the action looks good, but it’s a different type of action that you might see in a western or gangster movie.
Most of the action is in the form of these 18th century ships firing their cannons at each other and the miniature work and matte paintings still hold up today. I was surprised at how effective the ship battles were. Cutting back and forth between the sets portraying the decks of the ships to the models still look great. Sure, there are a couple instances where a model looks like a model bobbing around in the water, but those are the minority. The use of a combo of models, sets, and matte paintings when Hornblower and his men are sneaking on board another ship were especially effective. There are a few matte shots (not matte paintings) where the background was added in post-production that have those messy “matte lines” around the foreground characters but for 1951 they looked all right. As with most films of the time by people not named Orson Welles, the camera remains fairly static with most movements coming from pans and zooms. There is one instance in this movie where the camera pulls back. It’s the only time I noticed anything like it in the entire movie. It’s the moment when Lady Wellesly is leaving the ship. She and Hornblower had formed a relationship and as she is taken from the ship the camera is on him, and it pulls back making him look smaller and smaller signifying his feeling of being left behind. I wish there had been more of that, but that one was very effective.
There is an actor who has a small part in this movie that I wanted to call out… a 28-year-old Christoper Lee plays the captain of a Spanish ship. He only has a few lines, and they were dubbed, due, I guess, to his inability at the time to come up with an effective enough Spanish accent. He is wearing a bit of make-up to make him appear a bit darker than his normal complexion. Which wasn’t terrible, but the actors playing the Central Americans are painted quite brown (did I mention the movie was in Technicolor?) and they have dark wigs and many have very fake sideburns and mustaches. They reminded me of how the Klingons would look 15 years later on Star Trek. It, along with their exaggerated accents, was jarring, but I figured there would be some white actors playing ethnic parts when they started talking about being near the Spanish Americas.
Even with the problematic portrayal of Latino characters, I had a good time with this movie. Even the fact that all the right people died in order for Hornblower and the Lady Wellesly to be together at the end. Which I commented out loud about when it happened. Gregory Peck is very tall and stoic and even has a sword fight scene, but it’s the interplay between the main characters that made the film worth my time. It’s not what I’d categorize as a swashbuckler, with a few of the trappings, but better drawn characters, motivations, and humor. I watched Captain Horatio Hornblower streamed on HBO Max but it is available on DVD for around $10. It looks like there is a Blu-ray release but only available in Europe at this time.
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