I am glad to be invited as a new author to this blog. I apologize my not so good English language writing, but I have studied it only three years at school for forty years ago. During some ten years I have read quite many books in English and corresponded with quite many people. This helps me a little. – – In this first blog writing I want to tell something about how it started in my case – this interest in Errol Flynn and becoming a fan of his.
I am Finnish and born in 1954 in Lappeenranta, a town in South Eastern part of Finland. Our family got the first TV in 1963. It meant that we started to watch many kind of programs. Among them were many serials and movies. I hadn´t heard about Errol Flynn before I first time saw some of his legendary films. This happened in 1971 when I was sixteen years old. Those films were The Sea Hawk, Captain Blood and Gentleman Jim. After these films Errol Flynn was one of the absolute top actors on my ranking list. The thing that especially made me a fan of his was his ability to use the sword. In two of these films were some remarkable sword duels and I admired the skills of Errol Flynn in using his sword. The most exciting was the one against Basil Rathbone in Captain Blood. In this film acted also the most charming young actress that I hadn´t seen ever before – Olivia de Havilland. She became my favourite, too.
One thing that also mattered in my becoming an Errol Flynn fan must have been the fact that I first saw those two sea adventures among his many films. Sea was the element that I loved then and even more now. Well, I had never seen the sea in my entire life, but loved it anyway. It must have come from books that I had read in my childhood – books by Enid Blyton. The Famous Five had many adventures on or near the sea. They made a big impression on me. Those sea adventure films are still the greatest favourites of mine among all Errol Flynn films.
During the seventies I only saw one more film of Errol Flynn and it was Dodge City. I became a believer in 1976 and lost all my interest in TV and movies. It lasted for a long time – almost 25 years. I bought my first satellite TV in 2000 and thus I could see TCM channel. And there I saw those favourite films of my youth. Among them were those wonderful Errol Flynn classics and many more. After those decades they aroused nostalgic feelings in me.
— Juhani
The Real Person!
August 3, 2013 at 8:38 pm
Juhani! Thanks for a wonderful post about how you became a Flynn fan, well done! And that is a rare photo you have included, too! Is it from Flynn’s time in Spain during the Spanish Civil War? Thanks again for an interesting introduction about yourself!
Tim
August 4, 2013 at 2:40 pm
What a tremendous account of how you came to admire Errol & Olivia, Juhani! Thanks so much for telling us!!
Good to hear that Flynnland still encompasses Finland!!!
You got me searching and I came across this awesome image of Errol on Finland’s APU magazine:
www.whosdatedwho.com…
Juhani Kapiainen
August 8, 2013 at 11:10 am
Hi Tim, thanks for beautiful words. I have that APU magazine with Errol on the cover. This magazine still appears weekly. – It´s my pleasure to be this way among other Errol Flynn fans.
The Real Person!
August 5, 2013 at 12:09 am
Hello, Juhani and welcome to the Errol Flynn blog. This may seem a weird query, but as you are from Finland, I thought I might ask. In the 1980s a film starring Sean Flynn, Errol’s son was released on home video in Finland. That film was released In English with Finnish subtitles. The English title was “Duel at the Rio Grande.” The Finnish title was, “Zorron Merkki”. As this film is not available anywhere else as far as I know, if you know anyone who has this video or where I may get a copy I would appreciate the information, (The film is being shown on YouTube in German, but the German version is edited different than the English version; also I don’t speak or understand German) Thank you and again welcome to the Errol Flynn blog.–A. R.
(P. S. I tried to add an image, but without knowing the image URL, I could not do it.)–A. R.
The Real Person!
August 6, 2013 at 6:10 pm
Angel, thanks for your kind comment. It´s great to be an author on this blog. You asked about the Finnish release of “Duel at the Rio Grande” (“Zorron merkki”). Good news: I found it and probably will get it soon after the 18th of August. It was released in VHS form. Before your comment I had never heard about this film.
The Real Person!
August 6, 2013 at 9:20 pm
Juhani! That’s great news! If you watch the film I believe you may agree that in his sword fighting scenes he looks like he is almost channeling Errol! I would be very interested in getting a copy for myself. Let me know if that is possible.–A. R.
The Real Person!
August 25, 2013 at 8:39 pm
Hi Juhani;
Welcome to our fabulous Blog and we look forwards to all your posts of interest about “Our Man from Hollywood”
Your story of how you became a fan is very interesting and thank you for sharing it. We all look forward to hear more from you!