Before the mast

[lesser_celery]

I finally saw Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest last night and thoroughly enjoyed it, even though I haven’t yet seen the first PotC.

When I was a kid, one of my very favorite movies was The Spanish Main (1945), starring Paul Henreid as a Dutchman forced by political circumstance to become a pirate captain, Maureen O'Hara as the kidnapped beauty, and Walter Slezak as the slimy viceroy. Plus Binnie (yes, Binnie) Barnes as the female pirate who serves as a foil for O'Hara's character. gaudior speaks of the tropes PotC: DMC explores. If you can find The Spanish Main, which I have yet to locate on either VHS or DVD, you’ll see a big-budget pirate movie with many tropes PotC: DMC playfully inverts.

Because it was so much the great romantic film, The Spanish Main is virtually unknown today. The movie was nominated for an Academy Award for cinematography, and its sea-faring score is fabulous, in that Russian Romantic sort of way.

Those who know me only as editor of Not One of Us will not believe that I was a hopeless romantic when I was thirteen. A big fan of Rimsky-Korsakov, I would alternate Scheherezade and Cream’s “Tales of Brave Ulysses” on my turntable.

I plan to say more about PotC: DMC when and if my life permits. I have read most of the wide variety of comments those of you on my friends list have written, and I have been trading tidbits with sovay ever since I returned fron the theater last night. Just need a little discretionary time to organize my thoughts.

And the Most Creative Use of Shish Kabob Award goes to....

Comments

[lesser-celery.livejournal.com]

Hey, even I wasn't born when that movie came out. Are you a Henry Wilcoxen fan, too? I know some virtually forgotten big-budget movies even older than The Spanish Main, like Cecil B. DeMille's The Crusades. I do own that one of VHS. You'd think the Bushies would revive The Crusades...I mean the movie. Bonus trivia: it was Loretta Young's film debut.

[sovay]

Mostly I'm a Walter Slezak fan. Although my mind boggles at envisioning him as a slimy Spanish viceroy.

. . . It has Fritz Leiber, Sr.! I must see this film.