Good stunts are ageless. The adventure film The Black Pirate premiered in 1926, but in the timeless celluloid heaven that all movie-lovers know, Douglas Fairbanks is using his knife to glide down the sail of a pirate ship right now, and he always will be.
This (literal) slice of (figurative) heaven is available to anyone. For all the ostensible barriers to entry that more casual viewers might find in a silent film in two-strip Technicolor, nothing can get in the way of the pleasure of well-executed daring. I also find it hard to imagine watching the swimming scene, a coordinated masterpiece of theatrical technique and cinematic trickery, without feeling awe. In a contemporary movie, there’s rarely a need for a layman to wonder how they did that, because while “computers” is an oversimplified answer, it’s also more or less a correct one. Here, the answer is less obvious, so the question is far more exciting.
The story isn’t bad either. Fairbanks plays the titular pirate, but he starts out as only a passenger set upon by pirates. They blow up his ship (more top-notch spectacle) and kill his father, leaving him vowing a revenge that he takes care of, uh, almost immediately, thanks to a “prove your chops” pirate recruitment duel.
The speed with which Fairbanks’s character kills the Pirate Captain (Anders Randolf) does lead to the plot getting a bit muddied for a while. I’m still not sure if he deems the Pirate Lieutenant (Sam De Grasse) responsible too and so sticks around to take care of him in the bargain or if—elevated to the captaincy but surrounded by a violent crew1 he’s not sure he can trust—he’s simply playing along to survive long enough to find an exit. The latter option makes the most sense, but Fairbanks’s sense of fun is too obvious to sell it. The guy’s not that stressed.
At least, he’s not until his (incredibly cool) single-handed seizing of a ship puts him in a position of being partly complicit in rape and mass murder. The Black Pirate keeps things brisk, but that doesn’t always mean it keeps them light: Billie Dove’s Isobel, Fairbanks’s character’s love interest, is in plausible danger of assault throughout. He exerts all his cleverness to protect her, promoting a ransom scheme for both her and her unharmed ship, but the Lieutenant is so desperate to take Isobel against her will that he’ll lose a fortune to ensure it, and there goes the ship and everyone else on it. Isobel will be luckier, but the movie works to make you—and Fairbanks—wonder about it. The romance isn’t all that convincing, but the stakes are.
Prioritizing the stakes is a decision I can get behind, because the stakes lend significance and purpose to the action and create new opportunities for it, and again, the action is where the film really shines. At its best, that includes decision-making and strategizing along with the stunts. Director Albert Parker and writer Jack Cunningham know when and how to turn to pure drama: the Pirate Lieutenant walking Fairbanks to the edge of the plank and only then whispering to him that his best hope of saving Isobel is gone is diabolically effective. Now that will shiver your timbers.
The Black Pirate is streaming on Tubi.
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Lauren James
Lauren James is a writer who wears many different hats (and pen names). She lives in Connecticut with her wife and two cats.
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Year of the Month
A gentleman's guide to hauntings.
Streaming Shuffle
This ruined me. It should have ruined a whole generation.
Department of
Conversation
What did we watch?
Justified, Season Six, Episode Nine, “Burned”
“Pleased to meet you.” / “Wouldn’t rush to judgement on that.”
Ah, so. The point emerges. It isn’t just Raylan who’s contemplating his long-term prospects, or even Boyd – it’s the whole town. Markem, Boyd, and now Loretta are battling for the soul of the town; a cliche way for a show with a world where you say things like “the setting is a character”, but a good one. I think the show has earned that kind of contemplation, too – it’s really asking whether it’ll throw its lot in with systemic and reliable evil like Markem, solid and volatile evil like Boyd, or possibly Raylan’s lawfulness, though that has no specific voice beyond Raylan’s limited influence on Loretta. She’s been warped by her experiences enough that she’s basically one foot in the Boyd lifestyle as it is. So now I’m forced to ask what hill happen to Harlen as much as anybody in the show.
Biggest Laugh: “You’re supposed to be the grown-up.” / “Eh, you’re only as young as you feel, Duffy.”
Biggest Non-Art Laugh: “I’m sorry, who am I addressing as Chief?” / “Her.” / “Me.” / “Well, Mr Mullen…”
Top Ownage: “Think it’s in here… yep.”
Actually spread out over two nights, but I wanted the neatness of that Tales from the Crypt line-up yesterday:
The Three Musketeers
Swashbuckler Summer #13, as recommended by Casper. This is an energetic, buoyant ’90s romp, only intermittently good in the strictest sense but basically always fun, especially since it has a stacked cast that includes Kiefer Sutherland, Charlie Sheen, Tim Curry, Rebecca De Mornay, Michael Wincott, etc. Julie Delpy and Paul McGann even show up, and while they don’t get to do very much, it’s nice to see them. Very phoned-in love story for D’Artagnan, but he gets a ton of terrific, engaging swordplay, so it all evens out. I had a lot of fun with this. Also, De Mornay threatens to forcibly circumcise Tim Curry, which is not the kind of thing you get in live-action Disney anymore: we live in a declining age.
The Cable Guy
What if Jim Carrey tried to be your friend? A clear precursor to Friendship, but with the volume knob intentionally broken off. I distinctly remember the VHS cover of this scaring me when I was a kid, and you know what, I was right: beneath all the jokes, this is a pretty effective bit of stalker-horror.
Somewhere in Time
For Movie Club. The sense of longing when the lovers are apart is powerful, and I can never get enough of bits of time travel payoff like when we see the iconic photograph being taken. But the movie’s bittersweetness and romanticism is stronger than its actual romance, and when the two leads are together, as charming as they are, the energy sputters out. I’m also not sure we need Christopher Plummer as an antagonist here; it feels like “separated by time” is enough of a conflict to be getting on with, and he’s superfluous and (as the friend I watched this with pointed out) takes away from time that could be used to actually sell the leads getting to know each other and having some more in-person spark and rapport.
Such a great campy exchange!
“With a snap of my fingers, I could have you back on the block where I found you!”
“And with a flick of my wrist, I could change your religion.”
The Rosary Murders – Someone is going around Detroit killing nuns and priests (leaving rosaries in their dead hands), and the only person who knows anything is the priest who hears the killer’s confession, but of course cannot break the confessional seal. Despite being made in the late 80s, this has the feel of a 70s De Palma film, intentionally a bit tawdry, the urban landscape made harsh, though it’s hard to know what was the intent of director Fred Walton, not one of our great filmmakers. Two things help make this better than it should be: the script is co-written by Detroit’s own Elmore Leonard, and the star is Donald Sutherland, who invests his priest with humanity, a bit of cynicism, and an, er, inquisitive mind. Charles Durning is another priest but not quite as interesting. (There is also a subplot about a female reporter falling for Sutherland, who has no idea what to make of it, and neither do I.)
Elementary, “A Burden of Blood” – A woman is found suffocated with a plastic bag in her car. The main clue: the interrupted message she left for her husband. Soon we learn she is the daughter of a serial killer, and that connects to her murder but not how would have expected. This one straddles the line between clever and too clever, but it works for the most part. Meanwhile, Marcus is studying for the sergeant’s test, but Sherlock figures out that he doesn’t want the promotion, only a raise, so he and Joan find a clever (there’s that word again) way to help that won’t require Marcus taking a loan from Sherlock.
MASH, “The Most Unforgettable Characters” – Radar, trying to take a correspondence course for writers, jazzes up the daily reports, much to Potter’s consternation. And it’s Frank’s birthday, so Hawkeye and BJ give him a gift: they have an argument in front of him. Only the argument turns real. A generally solid episode – the best bit is Klinger threatening to immolate himself only Potter is soon on to him – and one that sets up the friendly rivalry that will emerge between Hawk and BJ as BJ is right: Hawkeye always want the last word.
In the Earth – this Ben Wheatley film has sat on my watchlist for a while, long enough to forget that this was his lockdown movie – made in a couple of weeks in Summer 2020 when restrictions briefly lifted. As such, it’s your classic small-cast, mostly-outdoor, pandemic-dread kind of affair, and it’s a little scrappy… but many Wheatley films are a little scrappy regardless of their production, so whatever. Anyway, this one is a folk-horror thing in a similar mode to A Field In England, but with a modern setting. It’s pretty decent by scrappy pandemic movie standards, a little forgettable otherwise, but Reece Shearsmith is very good, the Clint Mansell score is probably better than the movie really deserves and there’s some fun stuff with people making mad synth noises in the forest in an attempt to communicate with nature, so there are some interesting elements even if it didn’t fully work for me.
Tales From The Crypt, “Yellow” – Directed by Robert Zemeckis whose pitch-black sense of humor and camp sensibility infuse what might be a merely decent episode with something. Same with the father-son duo here being Kirk Douglas and Eric Douglas, the latter dying in 2001 from a drug overdose. This gives the plot, about a general condemning his cowardly son to death in World War 1 for desertion, an eerie pathos.
Oh, looking forward to getting to this one.
Year of the Month update!
This August, send us your pieces on any of these movies, albums, books, etc. from 2001!
TBD: James Williams: Millennium Actress
Aug. 7th: Gillian Nelson: Recess: School’s Out!
Aug. 14th: Gillian Nelson: The Princess Diaries
Aug. 16th: Tristan J. Nankervis: Mulholland Drive
Aug. 21st: Gillian Nelson: Disney’s California Adventure
Aug. 27th: Cori Domschot: The Mummy Returns
Aug. 28th: Gillian Nelson: Walt Disney Treasures
Then, this September, you can write about any of these movies, albums, books, etc. from 1937.