SEVENTY-FIVE YEARS AGO THIS WEEK
From Under the Sea, to the Top of the World
— Tim
Archive for November, 2018
The Hurricane
15
Nov
While it’s still hurricane season here in the U.S. …
LOS ANGELES EXAMINER – NOVEMBER 16, 1936
by LOUELLA O. PARSONS
Bargaining, I hear from a reliable authority, is going on between the Warner Brothers Studio and Samuel Goldwyn. Sam wants Errol Flynn for the lead in Hurricane and offers in exchange William Wyler, the director, and any other bit of property loose on the Goldwyn lot. First time I ever heard of a star being swapped for a director or vice versa. But Wyler is an ace director and is as valuable in his way as Flynn.
Not only has Sam set his heart on Flynn, but John Ford, who will direct for Goldwyn, also has the same idea. And talking about goofy trades, Ford agreed to direct Hurricane on condition that Sam buy him a boat and equipment to film exteriors in the South Seas where he is now vacationing. Margo, who is superb in Winterset, will probably get the lead opposite Flynn, with Basil Rathbone set for an important role.
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COULD THIS HAVE BEEN A GREAT ONE OF FLYNN? I believe so. With Wyler directing and the film earning three Academy Awards, but ultimately hampered by the casting of Jon Hall. Errol, IMO, could have lifted this to a Hollywood classic.
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Plus, there could have been some very good amour between Flynn and Lamour!
“The Hurricane is a 1937 film set in the South Seas, directed by John Ford and produced by Samuel Goldwyn Productions, about a Polynesian who is unjustly imprisoned. The climax features a special effects hurricane. It stars Dorothy Lamour and Jon Hall, with Mary Astor, C. Aubrey Smith, Thomas Mitchell, Raymond Massey, John Carradine, and Jerome Cowan. James Norman Hall, Jon Hall’s uncle, co-wrote the novel of the same name on which The Hurricane is based.”
The film was nominated for three Academy Awards, winning in the category for Best Sound.
Best Sound Recording – Thomas T. Moulton
Best Supporting Actor (nomination) – Thomas Mitchell
Best Music, Score (nomination) – Alfred Newman
New York Times critic Frank S. Nugent praised the climactic special effect created by James Basevi, stating, “It is a hurricane to blast you from the orchestra pit to the first mezzanine. It is a hurricane to film your eyes with spin-drift, to beat at your ears with its thunder, to clutch at your heart and send your diaphragm vaulting over your floating rib into the region just south of your tonsils.”
He complimented the performances of all of the principal actors with the exception of Hall, whose Terangi was described as “a competent Tarzan”. He also faulted the uneven pacing, but in the end, characterized the film as “one of the most thrilling spectacles the screen has provided this year.”
— Tim
Welcome to Modesto, Errolivia
14
Nov
EIGHTY YEARS AGO THIS WEEK
November 15, 1938
EVENING HERALD EXPRESS
by Harrison Carroll
Fans up at Modesto drove Olivia de Havilland and Errol Flynn to take refuge in their rooms. The stars, in location for Dodge City, tried to eat in the hotel coffee shop, but admirers pushed in a plate glass window in on them. A jagged hunk of glass just missed Flynn’s nose and landed spear-like in his steak.
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BTW, This incident likely occurred at one of the best hotels in downtown Modesto (Hotels Covell, Hughson, or Modesto), on one of the very streets (10th or 11th Street) where George Lucas later cruised cars as a teenager, as famously depicted in American Graffiti. … Though a relatively small, California Central Valley town, Modesto was nationally-renowned for it’s architecture.
— Tim
Film School for Spielberg — One Night Stand
14
Nov
35mm THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD (1938 version) at the Vista, Los Feliz
DATE AND TIME
Sat, November 17, 2018
10:30 AM – 1:00 PM PST
Vista Theatre
4473 Sunset Drive
Los Angeles, CA 90027
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 2018 10:30am: THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD (1938, dir by Michael Curtis, 35mm, Warner Brothers, USA)
Yeah, that’s right: THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD. No one has ever
come close to the swash-buckling joy and pure cinematic ecstasy of
Michael Curtiz’s 1938 masterpiece starring Errol Flynn, Olivia De Havilland, Claude Rains, and Basil Rathbone.
If you’ve never seen this version of the movie, you’ve never seen ROBIN HOOD. The movie quite possibly served as a single movie film school for much of the visual language of Steven Spielberg. Sword fights are played almost exclusively in shadow against walls. Action sequences are filled with bursts of expertly choreographed movement to and from the camera. But the whole movie holds together because of the glue of the great charismatic performances from all its leads.
Widely celebrated, director Michael Curtiz had a ridiculously talented grasp of cinematic language, blocking, action, style. If one wants to learn how to make a rip-roaring adventure movie, one studies Michael Curtiz. And this programmer suspects that Steven Spielberg spent a lot of time studying Curtiz before making such swashbucklers as JAWS and RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK.
Join us for 102 minutes of pure adventurous joy as lovable rogue Robin Hood (Errol Flynn) romances the beautiful and clever Maid Marion (the luminous Olivia De Havilland), fights the corruption of the selfish Prince Guy (the ever reliable scoundrel, Claude Rains) and crosses swords with the nefarious and murderous Sir Guy (Flynn’s regular foil, Basil Rathbone).
Filled with classic sequences of irrepressible energy and verve, THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD is one of the all-time great adventure movies.
— Tim
Jan van der Vliet Rocks his IN LIKE FLYNN t-shirt from Rory Flynn!
13
Nov
Jan lives in Spain where Errol was indeed In Like Flynn …
— David DeWitt
Mail Bag! Charge of the Light Brigade and Wiggling Toes!
12
Nov
This from Joe Maletta who points out a blooper in Errol’s Charge of the Light Brigade:
Joe Maletta One of Flynn’s best! The young boy is Scottie Beckett who played Perma the son of J. Carrol Nash’s character. Puran Singh. There is a film blooper when Puran finds and holds his dead son after the massacre at Chukoti. Flynn is trying to console him and as he is doing so, the “dead” son is Wiggling his toes! A little levity aside during a sad moment.
Thanks, Joe!
Scottie Beckett with Errol
— David DeWitt
God Speed, Stan Lee
12
Nov
“When I was a kid, my favorite superhero was Errol Flynn, the actor. He played Robin Hood, he played Captain Blood… He was the best guy in the world with two guns, but he was always smiling and cheerful and rescuing women. I used to leave the theater with an imaginary sword looking for women to rescue. I can think of nothing more fun than spending your life rescuing women.”
-Rotten Tomatoes asked Stan Lee “Now, would you say that Errol Flynn’s movies may have influenced some of your work? ”
Stan Lee answered: “Absolutely. Errol Flynn was my god. I wanted to be Errol Flynn. I wanted to be Errol Flynn, and I used to — I mention this to people — I used to… I was about ten years old, I don’t know. I’d walk out of the theater after an Errol Flynn movie; I’d have a crooked little smile on my face, the way I thought he smiled, and an imaginary sword at my side, and I’d be hoping that I could find some bully picking on a little girl so I could come to her rescue, you know?”
-The 1965 Marvel Comics character Fandral, a companion of the Norse God Thor and a member of the Warriors Three, was based on the likeness of Flynn by co-creator Stan Lee. Actor Joshua Dallas, who played the character in Thor, based his portrayal on Flynn.
— Tim
Rare Errol Flynn Audio Recordings, plus Special Bonus!
09
Nov
Today, I am adding a special offer to The Errol Flynn Blog! It is a fun way to enjoy 22 rare Errol Flynn audio recordings, plus a special “Surprise” bonus item. (A digital copy of 36 vintage newspaper articles from a privately collected series of Flynn articles published overseas almost 60 years ago … )
I have created a Menu to use to navigate the pages, and included individual audio players to listen to the shows and rare audio recordings. There is also an audio descriptions page. There are so many more Errol Flynn fans now than ever before on social media that might not have access to these recordings, so here is a fun way to collect and enjoy them on your desktop computers! Take a look … Click on the image!
— David DeWitt
