Flynnfest #55 - Green Light

Flynnfest #54 - Don't Bet On Blondes

Flynnfest #53 - The Cruise of the Zaca

Filmed in 1946-1947, but not released until 1952, The Cruise of the Zaca is acutally two cruises Flynn took at two different times (the color of the Zaca changes from white to black). It starts with Errol catching a helicopter to The Scripps Institute of Oceanography to meet with a group of scientists, and then agreeing to sponsor a research trip to collect rare fish and other sea animals. Along the way he picks up his father, a marine biologist, and his wife Nora Eddington, who by 1952 was in the middle of divorce proceedings from him.

There is some awesome footage of grey whales and other ocean activity, and great shots of the Zaca. Most of the rest of this short film, poorly narrated by Flynn himself, is pretty forgettable.

Flynnfest #52 - Deep Sea Fishing

Errol made this short, amateurish home movie in 1952 with close friend Howard Hill while fishing of the coast of Acapulco. It's silent, with a silly voice-over narration by another Flynn friend, Bob Edge. Errol had met Hill during the making of Robin Hood, when Hill was hired as his archery instructor. They remained drinking buddies for the rest of Flynn's life. The real star of this 10-minute short, however, are shots of Flynn's yatch, the Zaca, one of the greatest yatchs of the day, and still so to this day.

As for Deep Sea Fishing. OK. I saw it. Next!

Flynnfest #51 - Dive Bomber

Flynnfest #50 - Objective Burma

Flynnfest #49 - Northern Pursuit

So, not the best of the genre. But certainly not the worst, and respectable enough. Errol is in top dashing form, and at the height of his career, though this movie was running at the time of his rape trial.

A good addition to the Flynnfest mix. Well, I liked it, at least.

Flynnfest #48 - Assault of the Cuban Rebel Girls

What can you say about what is universally regarded as one of the worst movies ever made? More to come later. But for now, I'll just reprint another reviewer's pretty spot on comments -

CUBAN REBEL GIRLS, the wretched last film of legendary star Errol Flynn, is a tragic epitaph. It's only 'value' is the morbid opportunity to see the actor's physical deterioration in the last few months of his life, coupled with his inability to give an even cursory performance.

While the rationale behind the production was the obvious tax write-off that a failed film could provide, there are mysteries and legends surrounding it, as with many of the significant events in Flynn's life.

One legend involves the financial backing of the film. Flynn was nearly broke, despite maintaining an outwardly affluent appearance ("I believe you should always dress in your best suit, and present your best 'front', when you're borrowing money," he would tell his biographer, Earl Conrad). The actor had already taken (and spent) an advance from Putnam to write his autobiography (which would be published posthumously as 'My Wicked, Wicked Ways'), and the publishing firm, fearing the actor would not fulfill his obligation, assigned veteran journalist Conrad (with two court stenographers) to follow the actor, and interview him daily. Legend has it that Flynn also went to a variety of sources, some less 'savory' than others, to borrow 'front' money for a film he said he was making. As time passed, and the film hadn't appeared, Flynn found himself in an awkward and potentially dangerous situation with his backers...so he took what little he had left of the borrowed cash to assemble a crew, write a script, and shoot a 'quickie' in Cuba.

The other legend involved his girlfriend, sixteen-year old Beverly Aadland. Flynn had been the defendant in a number of statutory rape trials, dating back to 1943, and had been acquitted, usually because the teens in question could 'pass' as older, and, in some cases, even had faked IDs. With his well-publicized sexual appetites, Flynn was an easy 'target' for publicity-hungry young women of easy virtue. Aadland, who had already been involved with the actor for several years, seemed to vindicate his critics' charges that Flynn was not the 'innocent' that his lawyers claimed him to be, but truly had a 'thing' for young girls (making him the Roman Polanski of his time). But the voluptuous teen was, according to friends of Flynn, genuinely in love with the aging star, nursing him through his bouts of malaria, keeping him supplied with vodka, and tenaciously guarding what little privacy he could maintain. Her one dream was to become an actress, and Flynn, according to legend, wrote CUBAN REBEL GIRLS to give her the opportunity no studio ever would, with her notoriety.

Sadly, whether CUBAN REBEL GIRLS was created as a tax write-off, a product of a last-minute attempt to appease backers, or as a 'Valentine' to a controversial love, Errol Flynn's swansong was simply awful.

For technology buffs, the real stars of the film are the as-of-yet unidentified 1950s commercial helicopter and the rare Lockheed Electra L-188 "jet assist" turbo-prop airliner, one of the least successful commercial airplanes ever built.

Flynnfest #47 - The Warriors/The Dark Avenger

1955. Errol was still in his European respite. Made in between the doubly horrible King's Rhapsody and Let's Make Up, The Dark Avenger, also released at The Warriors, isn't that bad a movie. It's actually a pretty decent film, for a Class B Saturday matinee type movie from the mid-50s. The plot is pretty good, if not even remotely historically accurate (the relationship, and the age difference, between Prince Edward and Joan of Kent was distinctly different). But at least the history was closer to reality than Robin Hood or They Died With Their Boots On. {Plus, there are some surprising costars in this movie, including Peter Finch as an evil Frenchman (aren't they all), Christopher Lee in a minor part, as well as Patrick McGoohan in an equally bit part in his first movie role. The female lead, Joanne Dru, it has been said my some reviewers, looked "bored". Perhaps so. But this was a woman who started her career in She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, Red River, and All The King's Men. Unfortunately, by 1955, her career was already on a slow, second-rate auto-pilot. Ah, Hollywood.

Errol looks a bit bloated for his 46 years, but does very well in the action sequences and his horesemanship. Overall, not a bad movie. Of his bad European movies, this was perhaps the best of the lot.

Flynnfest #46 - The Adventures of Captain Fabian

La Taverne de N.O. is the French title of this French-American production filmed in Europe in 1951, during Errol's escape-to-Europe phase. It's considered by many to be one of Flynn's worst films (Cuban Rebel Girls notwithstanding). It is pretty bad. More than bad, it's just incredibly weird. Filled with incredibly unsympathetic main characters (leading lady Micheline Prelle plays, well, a psychopath), including Errol's soulless Captain Fabian, a properly despicable bad guy in Vincent Price (who turns out to be not so bad, considering how immoral the rest of the main characters are, and a truly nuts Agnes Moorehead in quasi-blackface - this movie had it all, accented by a truly horrible soundtrack with weird instrumental noise more akin to horror flicks. The credit list Errol as the story writer - I can only hope that was an affectation and not reality. It's not an unwatchable movie, as it is just weird enough to be strangely compelling.

Errol, by the way, looks a bit worn around the edges, but not too bad. Perhaps the air in the south of France was agreeing with him. Micheline Presle only made a few English-language movies, none of much note (American Guerrillas in the Philippines?), before divorcing Flynn's business partner, director, and producer on Captain Fabian William Marshall in 1954. After that, she moved back to Paris and has been a feature in French cinema for over 50 years.

Flynnfest #45 - That Forsyte Woman

Someone else wrote this, but it pretty much sums it up:

By the end of the 1940s, the WB had relegated one-time box office king Errol Flynn to 'B' movies, and offered him little studio support. While most of the stars under contract to the studio were still protected from unflattering publicity, Flynn's rape trial and subsequent revelations revealed a public far more tolerant of the star than the studio was, so Flynn was left 'to his own devices', and found himself the constant subject of scandalous headlines, a situation that became so intolerable that he would eventually sue 'Confidential' magazine, the most virulent of the 'scandal sheets'.

Therefore, when, negotiating a new contract in 1947, Flynn asked to be allowed to do one film a year away from the WB, the studio agreed, happily, more than pleased to let another studio pay the actor's salary and deal with his unsavory reputation. While the result of this new 'freedom' did not produce any Flynn 'classics' (KIM would be the best received of his work away from the WB), it did give him a seat at the table with Gable, Tracy, Hepburn, Garland, Taylor, and MGM's other legendary stars, when the studio celebrated their 'Golden Anniversary', in 1949.

THAT FORSYTHE WOMAN, Flynn's first film away from the WB, was a heavy-handed, ultimately unsuccessful adaptation of the first of John Galsworthy's trilogy of the rise and fall of a British aristocratic family, a popular series of works that would become the basis of the classic BBC series, 'Upstairs, Downstairs'. Offered his choice of the male 'leads' in the film, Flynn lobbied for, and got, the 'villain' of the story, the coldly ruthless Soames Forsythe, who marries MGM 'queen' Greer Garson, and proceeds to make her life a living hell. It was a major departure for Flynn, who had watched his roles at the WB deteriorate into a collection of jaded roués with a 'taste' for married women. While he acknowledged that he wasn't the easiest person to work with, he wanted to demonstrate, once and for all, that he was an actor capable of far more than leaping horses over cannons and swinging a sword. With Soames, Flynn proved he 'could deliver', even as a character you would be hard-pressed to feel sympathetic about.

As the men Garson would find comfort with, Robert Young (who had his own 'typecasting' problems, again playing a near juvenile when, in fact, he was older than Flynn!), and Walter Pidgeon (also playing a role younger than his actual age, but, as usual, winning Garson's heart), had to contend with poorly written, nearly cardboard roles (that Pidgeon 'comes off' so well is a testament to his often-overlooked acting talent...he was FAR more than just 'Garson's Leading Man').

Greer Garson, long 'typed' as the most aristocratic of MGM leading ladies, had to deliver some truly 'ripe' dialog, and her manipulation by 'class conscious' Soames seemed unrealistic and out of character, but she managed to survive the stodgy production with her reputation unblemished.

Filming was smooth and untroubled, and Garson was impressed by Flynn's professionalism (he was on his best behavior, for a change). He did, however, pull one memorable practical joke; in a very dramatic scene, as she packed to leave Soames, she opened a wooden wardrobe to discover Flynn, standing inside, naked, grinning from ear to ear! One NEVER pulled a stunt like that on a Major Star (Bette Davis would have had a tantrum), but Garson simply burst out laughing, appreciating Flynn's irreverence.

Flynnfest #44 - Never Say Goodbye

This is one of the few Errol Flynn movies that made me laugh out loud. It is a truly charming movie, in every positive sense of the word "charming". It reminded me a lot of Miracle on 34th Street. Yes, it is that good.

There is an irony about Errol. Despite his wicked reputation as a ladies man, lecher, on-set drunk and all-together ne'er do well, he was a great actor with children. In al of his on-screen roles, his various roles in which he interacts with children are certainly among his best, and - surprisingly - his most comfortable. That's part of the enigma. He was a great actor with children. In Never Say Goodbye, the chemistry is fantastic. Why isn't the movie better known now? Probably because the main story revolved around divorce, which was still pretty "off topic" in the mid-1940s. Pretty touchy stuff.

Eleanor Parker. What can you say? One of Errol's best costars. And, well, she's great. The chemistry between the two in this movie is palpable - mainly because Errol and Eleanor were actually so good together in front of the camera. Irony - one of Eleanor Parker's first big roles was in They Died With Their Boots On, but all of her scenes were axed and ended up on the cutting room floor. Hmmmm.

Before I digress - Forrest Tucker as the US Marine. Great. And greta with Errol. I can only imagine that they got along very well during filming.

Long story short. An overlooked classic of the era. A truly nice, nice, nice movie. Great stuff.

Flynnfest #43 - Uncertain Glory

What can I say? I liked this movie. Even at the time, it was completely off the normal track for Errol. There is a Casablanca aspect to this movie that I like. Probably Paul Lukas. Made the same year as his greatest - and Academy Award winning Watch on the Rhine - this was a great year for Paul Lukas. He later starred with Errol in the 1958 movie The Roots of Heaven, one of Errol's best later movies, made good no doubt to Lukas' presence. He was also with Errol in Kim - yet to be reviewed.

The story is unconventional, but in a very Errol sort of way. He plays an unrepentent scoundrel, a role he played in real life, but he certainly wasn't the unreformed murderer he plays in this role.

Heck, I might add more later. But I've got to move on with Flynnfest. This is a really good film, particularly for those who understand the films of the WWII era and the propaganda genre of the time (I like to think I understand it fairly well). And Errol is really friggin' good in this movie. 'Nuff said. Thumbs up.

Flynnfest #42 - Edge of Darkness

This is one of my favorite Errol films. Right up there with Objective Burma and Rocky Mountain. This movie is awesome.

Made at the height of his artistic career as an actor, Edge of Darkness was made at what ultimately became the turning point - and not in a good way - of his personal life and professional downward spiral that lasted until his death in 1959. In the middle of making Edge of Darkness, Flynn was indicted for statutory rape, with a resulting trial that scarred and changed him. At the same time, co-star Ann Sheridan had a very public and messy separation and ultimate divorce from Flynn, in no small part due to an affair she had had with Flynn after making Dodge City together. movie.

The movie was filmed in the Monterey area, with the cannery scenes filmed on Monterey Row. Unfortunately, the very Central Coast weather delayed filming for weeks due to fog. It was all so much easier in LA, I suppose. But LA doesn't look like Norway.

But it was a movie of it's time. That is, a great World War II propaganda movie, intended to educate and inspire the home front about the evils of Nazi Germany and the heroic suffering of the Norwegian people. However, rare for WWII propaganda films, it didn't shy away from fully portraying the quislings (a term unfortunately a product of Norway) and cowardice that also accompanies war. In that regard, it's a pretty rare war movie. And I like it. So there.

Flynnfest #41 - Istanbul

Istanbul (1957) is perhaps Errol's best movie from his European exile, and played a huge role in his return to Hollywood a year later. A remake of the 1947 film Singapore, it's thought by most watchers to be a superior film than the 1947 original. It is sometimes compared to Casablanca - but not nearly as good as that classic. Errol certainly shows his age, but he looks pretty healthy nonetheless. His female co-star, Cornell Borchers, was touted as the new Ingrid Bergman. Similar look, similar accent, but not the same screen presence. Born in Lithuania, she made three more movies in Germany, and then retired from movies in 1959 and moved to Bavaria.

So, not a bad film. Decent story, pretty good supporting cast. Errol seems up to task. And you have Nat King Cole singing two songs and playing piano. That alone is worth the price of admission.

Flynnfest #40 - Cry Wolf

How can you not like a movie with Barbara Stanwyck? Serouisly. Is it possible?
This was Errol's one full dive into film noir. OK - it's no Night of the Hunter, but it's still a pretty decent film for both the genre and period. I will telll y'all (you all being the no one on earth that reads this post) that I had figured out the "insanity runs in the family" plot twist about half-way through the movie. Doesn't matter. Errol plays a very strong character, but against his popular image at the time. He rarely played stick-in-the-mud anal-retentive snobs (his best being much later in That Forsyte Woman) later That Forsyte Woman, but when he did, he did it well.

Other notes - There is zero comic relief in this film, or any of Errol's normal comic second bananas, like Alan Hale or Guinn "Big Boy" Williams. It was played true to form for the genre.

Bottom line - very solid basic story. The film dragged a bit. However - Barbara Stanwyck. Errol at his peak! How could the studio have messed this up? In the end, a weak plt, to my thinking? But still a very solid Errol film. It's a shame he didn;t make morewith Barbara Stanwyck. Jeez, she's good.

Flynnfest #39 - Too Much Too Soon

In 1958, less than two years before his own death, Errol returned to Warner Brothers to play his idol and role-model John Barrymore (who died in 1942 of alcoholism) in this adaptation of daughter Diana Barrymore's miserable tale of growing up as a child of two famous celebrities, John and seriously repressed poet Michael Strange.

I'll keep this short. Errol's portrayal of John Barrymore was closer to the heart than perhaps he ever imagined. Typecast doesn't even start to describe it. Dorothy Malone struggled hard to portray the complexity of Diana Barrymore - even harder to do within the limits of 1950s film norms. Sad on a couple of levels. Like Diana Barrymore,an actress. Even more sadly, and perhaps prophetically, the happy ending of Too Much Too Soon (Diana, out of rehab, clean and sober) was premature. Unfortunately, she died of an overdose of alcohol and sleeping pills in 1960, two years after the film was released. Sad.

Flynnfest #38 - The Perfect Specimen

Hey, I like this movie. Many contemporary critics don't "get it" - but that's because they don't understand the appeal of the "screwball comedy" genre to the film audience of the 1930s. There are contemporary equivalents to screwball comedy (many Adam Sandler movies fall into this group), but screwball itself is truly a product of its Depression-era time.And, as a result, true screwball comedy from the 30s doesn't always translate well to a different era. True, Marx Brothers are perhaps the masters of the genre, but it is equally true that many Marx Brothers bits fall flat when seen today. Still, many Marx Brothers officianados and film snobs would never admit that anything in Duck Soup or A Night At The Opera might be anything less than comic genius. Heck, they were gags, and not all of those gags were quite as funny the second, third, or 100th time seen.

OK, The Perfect Specimen wasn't the best attempt, or even the most serious attempt made during the era. It was a quick attempt to cash in on the fad. Overall, it was a pretty good film, though. Errol is genuinely likeable. And Joan Blondell has an energy and great sense of comedic timing that carries the day. The Perfect Specimen is considered one of Joan Blondell's better movies from the 1930s. Here's the original 1937 New York Times movie review:

The Perfect Specimen (1937)

THE SCREEN; With Errol Flynn as Exhibit A, the Warners Present 'The Perfect Specimen' at the Strand Theatre

By FRANK S. NUGENT
Published: October 28, 1937
Although, strictly speaking, the Strand's "A Perfect Specimen" is somewhat less than that, it has most of the attributes of light and unaffected romantic comedy. A refreshing awareness of its own unimportance is a major asset; so are the cheery performances of Errol Flynn, Joan Blondell and such Warner inveterates as Allen Jenkins, Hugh Herbert and Edward Everett Horton. Under Michael Curtiz's agile direction and the tickling touch of a five-man script, it has become a reasonably diverting little show, juvenile and school-girlish to be sure, yet deft enough and daft enough to slip beneath the critical guard.

Stemming from a Samuel Hopkins Adams novel, it considers the case of Gerald Beresford Wicks, who some day must assume control of Wicks Utilities ($30,000,000 and 10,000 employes) and who has been dedicated from babyhood by his eccentric grandmother to a program of mental, moral and physical perfection. Gerald, we quickly discover, has never been beyond the gates of Wickstead, is engaged—to their mutual dissatisfaction—to a girl named Alicia, studies Newton while swinging from a tree and is equally gifted at taking a motor apart or settling a problem in international law. It should be vaguely upsetting to hear that Gerald adds up to Errol Flynn.

Into this masculine convent, into this posted temple of perfection comes Miss Blondell—a blonde serpent—to whisper about the great world outside, to suggest a Don Quixotic campaign of windmill-tilting and to accompany the truant upon a fairly eventful tour of the Pennsylvania hinterland. Among the windmills the new Quixote tilts at are, in approximate order, a pugnacious truck driver, a prize fighter, the G-men, Grandma Wicks and Miss Blondell herself. The fatality rate of the windmills is terrific; the Wicks perfection is irresistible.

Admitting that this is the sort of romantic balderdash dear to the hearts of misses in their 'teens, full of giggling situations (as when Hugh Herbert mistakes the errant couple for man and wife and lodges them in a bedroom), still the treatment has been genial and we prefer to regard it charitably. Two of the minor players deserving of special praise are Dennie Moore, for a pricelesly funny impersonation of Allen Jenkins's girl-friend, Clarabelle, and Harry Davenport, for his perfect portrayal of the absentminded professor.

THE PERFECT SPECIMEN, based on the novel by Samuel Hopkins Adams; screen play by Norman Reilly Raine, Lawrence Riley, Brewster Morse and Fritz Falkenstein; directed by Michael Curtiz; a Warner Brothers production. At the Strand.
Gerald Beresford Wicks . . . . . Errol Flynn
Mona Carter . . . . . Joan Blondell
Killigrew Shawe . . . . . Hugh Herbert
Mr. Grattan . . . . . Edward Everett Horton
Jink Carter . . . . . Dick Foran
Alicia . . . . . Beverly Roberts
Mrs. Leona Wicks . . . . . May Robson
Pinky . . . . . Allen Jenkins
Clarabelle . . . . . Dennie Moore
Hotel Clerk . . . . . Hugh O'Connell
Snodgrass . . . . . James Burke
Hooker . . . . . Granville Bates
Carl Carter . . . . . Harry Davenport
Briggs . . . . . Tim Henning

Final note - the reviewer for the 1937 NYT article is Frank Nugent. A Columbia University journalism graduate, he was the NYT film critic from 1936 to 1940. His highly positive review of The Wizard of Oz was seen as key to its success. He was eventually hired by Darryl F Zanuck as a screenwriter, which led to his eventual fame as the writer for John Ford and some of the best westerns ever made, including John Wayne classics The Searchers, Fort Apache, and 3 Godfathers, as well as The Quiet Man and Mr Roberts.Hey, the guy knew his stuff.

Flynnfest #37 - Escape Me Never

Escape Me Never was an unusual bomb for Errol. It seems that everyone in it was miscast. Many Flynnfans have theorized about the whys and why nots of Escape Me Never (mostly along the lines of "What was Jack Warner thinking?"), and, other than agreeing that Errol was unfortunately typecast as a cad and womanizer (and a thoroughly unsympathetic one, at that), very little else is commonly agreed upon, except that this isn't a particularly good film. In the end, the original 1947 New York Times review wasn't far off:

Escape Me Never (1947)

By BOSLEY CROWTHERT.M.P.
Published: November 8, 1947

Out of simple respect for Elisabeth Bergner, who appeared here a dozen years back in a little film called "Escape Me Never," we are loathe to record that the new film of that same title which put in an appearance at the Strand yesterday is based thereon. For Miss Bergner is a subtle little actress—and we'd hate to have anyone, seeing Ida Lupino in the new picture get false and misguided ideas. Any resemblance between the two performers is purely coincidental, you may be sure.

Agreed that "Escape Me Never" was no great shakes the first time around, being a trifling bit of flimflam about a small lady's loyalty to a cad. As now performed by Miss Lupino as the lady and by Errol Flynn as the cad, it becomes something harsh and unbelievable, like a terrible faux-pas in a grade-school play.

Miss Lupino is downright embarrassing, the way she bounces and kitty-cats around, alternately clutching an infant and Mr. Flynn to her heaving breast. And Mr. Flynn, as a chap named Sebastian who writes music, plays a concertina and loves to flirt, throws himself into his performance with the enthusiasm of a singing-waiter in a Hoboken café.

They're not to blame entirely. The script is a frightful thing, starting out in a musical-comedy humor and ending up in a bath of tragic tears. And Peter Godfrey's so-called direction is cause for a damage suit against the whole retinue of Warner Brothers by the exploited members of the cast—among whom, incidentally, Eleanor Parker has our deepest sympathy.

But Mr. Flynn and Miss Lupino—or the other way around, if you please—could have countered with passive resistance and saved us all from a pitiable ordeal.

On the stage at the Strand are Frankie Carle and his orchestra, plus Jack E. Leonard and Olsen and Joy.

ESCAPE ME NEVER, screen play by Thames Williamson: based on the novel and play by Margaret Kennedy; directed by Peter Godfrey; produced by Henry Blanke for Warner Bros. Pictures. Inc. At the Strand.
Sebastian . . . . . Errol Flynn
Gemma . . . . . Ida Lupino
Fenella . . . . . Eleanor Parker
Caryl . . . . . Gig Young
Ivor MacLean . . . . . Reginald Denny
Mrs. MacLean . . . . . Isobel Elsom
Heinrich . . . . . Albert Basserman
Steinach . . . . . Ludwig Stossel
Landlady . . . . . Helene Thimig
Guide . . . . . Frank Puglia
Minister . . . . . Frank Reicher
Ballet Specialty . . . . . Milada Mladova
George Zoritch