As I begin to wrap up my personal Swashbuckler Summer, it feels only right to acknowledge this distinguished entry. C.S. Forester’s Hornblower novels are a foundational Age of Sail text, and here, Raoul Walsh cobbles several of them together into a single handsome adaptation.
Gregory Peck pulls off the difficult but necessary trick of making Hornblower a convincingly awkward hero: brilliant and honorable he may be, but suave he is not. In the best joke here, Robert Beatty’s loyal Lieutenant Bush, who’s been making bank all movie long by always betting on his captain’s skills, silently requests his friend pay up to honor his one unflattering prediction: that Hornblower’s response to unexpectedly meeting an attractive woman will be nothing smoother than a flurry of his signature throat-clearing.
This is necessary, because a more socially adept Hornblower would be an all-too-perfect bore. Peck, easily one of the most handsome men of his time, does a remarkable bit of physical acting here to reduce his dark good looks—or at least convince us that Hornblower is either unaware of them or imprisoned by them. It’s like he’s playing a gangly stork who’s still surprised at finding himself in this particular body and this particular life. He has morals, principles, and innumerable practical competencies, and thankfully, the Navy has given him a life where all that matters more than savoir-faire.1
The film follows him through several vaguely interconnected adventures. The first, which involves a raving Central American madman in brownface, is by the far of the worst of them, but viewers who can make it through those scenes can settle into some strong, likable seafaring adventure (with occasional land-based escapades for leaven). The naval battles can’t live up to the liveliness of, say, Captain Blood, but they’re well-staged and fun; the episodic structure also lets us track the development of supporting characters like the pressed Quist (James Robertson Justice), who goes from a confirmed Hornblower skeptic to a true believer … and doesn’t even have to further prove his feudal loyalty by remaining in the Navy a second longer than he has to, which honestly surprised me. Good for him.
If there’s a further flaw here, it’s that Hornblower’s successes are a little too gaudy and quickly earned for my taste. His love interest, Virginia Mayo’s Barbara, isn’t just a warm, adventurous woman who’s willing to lend a hand in a crisis: she’s the Duke of Wellington’s (fictional) sister. Oh, they can’t be together because she’s engaged and he’s already married? Don’t even worry about it, because both obstacles will be neatly killed off in time for the credits to roll. (For a twofer, Barbara’s fiancé-turned husband was also Hornblower’s hostile superior officer who could have damaged his career. Double sayonara to that guy.) But then, almost all swashbucklers have this kind of charmed breeziness to them, even if they don’t all go down this easily. If you’re here to have fun, this is fun—and fun that’s anchored in a lovingly crafted lead performance, no less.
I suspect that nowadays, most people who are looking for an on-screen Hornblower turn to the very good ITV and A&E series with Ioan Gruffudd. I have immensely fond memories of those TV movies2, but let’s not forget about Peck. He had the right stuff.
Captain Horatio Hornblower is streaming on HBO Max.
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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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Anthologized
A solid punchline (but not enough punch).
Anthologized
Tune in to a world on the brink.
Anthologized
No matter what face he's wearing, this guy's the worst.
Department of
Conversation
What did we watch?
Justified, Season Six, Episode Eleven, “Fugitive Number One”
“Creepy how excited you seem right now, not that I’m questioning your priorities.”
“Didn’t know you love classical, Mikey.”
“You’d know if you let me pick the music occasionally.”
This is the point where we’re basically waiting out the inevitable; this is also the point where the show feels like it’s falling back on its strengths with the brutality and shock. I feel like I’ll have nothing new to say until the final episode, and then I’ll have a whole essay afterwards about the whole thing, so that’ll be fun. It is pretty frustrating that I have to wait out until the end of a season to have something to say about this show, much as I enjoy it in the moment. It’s really good entertainment. I’d probably have more to say about it the second time around.
Biggest Laugh: “How bad is it?” / “Well, I shaved.”
Biggest Non-Art Laugh: “You’re not the one shot him, are ya?”
Top Ownage: Mikey vs Katherine is probably the most Justified violence in the show; certainly the most Tarantinoesque.
It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia, Season Eighteen, Episode One, “Frank Marries A Corpse”
Instant classic, right from the instant top five cut to title. Charlie Day wrote this one, and I’m always delighted at how much the show picks up when the central trio dive into the actual writing. I think my hardest laugh was actually the callbacks to Dennis’s onion, but Mac coming out to his mum was also a highlight.
“That went better than I thought.” “Did it? Did it?” Exploded in laughter when her head fell off.
Was talking to someone about it who hasn’t seen the episode yet, and they thought the show has gotten less of an edge lately, and I tried to tell them – perhaps in general, but this episode is definitely a return to form in the edginess department.
Babylon 5, “Mind War”
A smorgasbord of cool stuff in this episode, as we get Walter Koenig as a chillingly buttoned-up Psi-Corp agent who tramples all over the boundaries someone like Talia tries to respect and two different kinds of cosmic power, one longstanding and one in evolution. And G’Kar provides Catherine with a much-needed assist.
William Allen Young’s Jason Ironheart (awesome name, as my wife correctly enthused) is a Psi-Corp officer himself, an old instructor and lover of Talia’s, but he’s been uplifted into new and unexplored realms of power–including finely tuned telekinesis, ideal for assassinations–and is now on the run to escape the people who would force him to use it. Young has a good warm gravitas that can tip back and forth between human and portentously solemn, as befits an evolving power, and he has good chemistry with Andrea Thompson. But as a manifestation of official, authorized horror, Koenig is so precise and cutthroat that he steals the show. He’s almost but not quite dead-eyed: the spark of life left in his gaze means nothing good for anyone around him, though. And while he can be contained and outplayed for right now, it’s hard to believe that will last forever.
Out of all the actors, Koenig is the one taking the most pleasure out of saying Straczynski’s dialogue – not that anyone’s really bad, but Jurasik as Londo, while putting effort in, isn’t enjoying the very sound of the words the way Koenig is. It feels like it ties into the way Bester represents fascism itself, as a personal force.
90° in the Shade – In 60s Prague (a lot more westernized than I would have expected), a shopgirl struggles in the aftermath of an affair with her married boss, who drags her into his scheme to hide fraud at his shop from an auditor. Who is also unhappy in his marriage and who is attracted to the shopgirl. An Anglo-Czech production, directed by Jiří Weiss and with stellar cinematography by Bedrich Batka, this is occasionally murky and slow moving, but is overall a solid noir set in a place you would not expect it. Anne Heywood is excellent as the ill fated shopgirl.
Barney Miller, “Hair” – I have also fallen behind on writing up this show. Suffice it to say, as the first season moves along, the stories are more assured and the guest stars are more solid. Here, Michael Lembeck is a new member of the detective squad who loathes having to get rid of his Serpico beard from his work with Narcotics, and struggles to be taken seriously when everyone sees his baby face. Also look for a young Charles Fleischer.
Live baseball – The Mets didn’t fare well, but a night at the ballgame is still a night at the ballgame. The national anthem was sung well by Liz Calloway (Broadway regular and the singing voice of Anastasia), and former Met Jose Iglesias was there to promote his upcoming debut in Buena Vista Social Club. The PA voice said he’s the first major leaguer ever to appear on Broadway, and I guess that is true if you mean “in an ongoing play or musical.” But baseball players used to do vaudeville in the offseason, so odds are at least some of the older theaters hosted baseball players many times.
Woo, live baseball! I listened to a podcast episode about depictions of Russia in musicals featuring a Soviet refugee and she commented on how weird Anastasia is to her in that context. But now I have that “Rumor in St. Petersburg” song stuck in my head.
… And now, so do I.
Perhaps I can be released from the curse!
You got to see a huge Tatis Jr. performance too.
Alas, yes. Could have picked one of the other games, but I get the Tatis Steals a Grand Slame Game.
Twin Peaks, S2 E20 “The Path to the Black Lodge” – some excellent creeping dread here as the end of S2 approaches, and director Stephen “you know my kids” Gyllenhaal does a much better job with the Lynchian sequences than some of the other directors. It’s not the most thrilling episode otherwise, the recurring hand tremors do a good job showing that something truly momentous is going to happen but Windom Earle gets a lot of fairly tiresome screen-time and the other main plot in this episode is Audrey losing her virginity on Billy Zane’s private jet which… is appropriately soap-opera-y I guess. But Coop and Annie’s relationship is way more compelling with less screen time.
Seinfeld, S9 “The Blood” – a really zany one, but all of the plots are on a similar heightened level so it mostly works. George trying to combine his three passions (sex, food, television) is compellingly awful and Kramer’s adventures with blood donation are wild. Also Lloyd Bridges unexpectedly returns! Apparently his final TV appearance, and he’s very funny.
Let’s admit it — pastrami *is* the most sensual of the cured meats.
Always Sunny, “Dennis and Dee Do Not Get Rich” – Really leaning into the Philly-ness of it all with the Mummers Parade, this city is so goddamn weird. The morgue attendant is a good example of a guy with his own life and needs whose day is ruined by the Gang, or in this case Dennis and Dee.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QlBcWpY2nqk
You on the Captain’s discord all mocked me for posting this, you’ll RUE THE DAY! Agreed that it’s a horrific title, the content of the video however is stellar and possibly inadvertently points to something I’ve found to often be the case: comedies about self-interest and corruption actually age better than ones that assume everyone has the best intentions. It’s not that everyone doesn’t have their reasons, it’s that selfish venality is objectively funnier than kindness. Reno 911! is much, much, much funnier than Brooklyn 99 because every person on the show is a fucking asshole, and that doesn’t mean they don’t have wants or needs. They’re still fucking assholes.
I do plan to watch the video at some point, and this gives me licence to talk about something I also noticed: the funniest elements of the Nice© sitcoms tends to be when characters are cruel or stupid, and there’s usually at least a basic belief that people are cruel or stupid running under the thing – the further you get from the protagonists, the crueller and more stupid people tend to be.
There’s less Chosen One political thinking here, more Chosen People. If only everyone was like us! It’s typically insufferable.
My sister was very fond of the A&E series, though we both heartily laughed at one very corny line at an episode’s end.
Oh yeah, from what I remember, it definitely wasn’t short on corniness. But quite charming all the same. I’m pleased someone else here is familiar with it!
It was well-done from what I remember! I’m sure she’d have more thoughts than I do.
Might watch this tonight.
I’m curious what you’ll think! It’s also interesting to watch this as an SFF fan, knowing how much science fiction in particular has drawn from Hornblower over the years. I should really read the books.
Year of the Month update!
This September, you can write about any of these movies, albums, books, etc. from 1937.
Sept. 4th: Gillian Nelson: Moose Hunters
Sept. 6th: Tristan J. Nankervis: Lenin in October
Sept. 18th: Gillian Nelson: Pluto’s Quin-pup-lets
Sept. 20th: Tristan J. Nankervis: The Hobbit
Sept. 22nd: Lauren James: Stage Door
Sept. 25th: Gillian Nelson: Donald’s Ostrich
And there’s still time to write up any of these movies, albums, books, etc. from 2001 for this month!
TBD: James Williams: Millennium Actress
Aug. 21st: Gillian Nelson: Disney’s California Adventure
Aug. 27th: Cori Domschot: The Mummy Returns
Aug. 28th: Gillian Nelson: Walt Disney Treasures
My dad did not really steer me in the direction of books that I would love, but he did turn me on the Hornblower series, which I adored, even if, to this day, the rules of whist completely elude me.
In later years, Forester proved to be invaluable in getting through the terminology and tactics of 18th Century naval warfare in Patrick O’Brien’s books. I got to look like a smarty pants when explaining to friends what the hell was actually going on in those books.
I intermittently think I’ve gotten the hang of bridge and cricket from reading about them, but then I always forget again; I suspect whist would similarly elude me.
I’m hoping my Patrick O’Brian familiarity will help me with Hornblower, so I’ll be doing this in reverse!