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Review
by
Troy Howarth
Film:3
:
DVD:7
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| Robin
Hood (Richard Greene) and his merry men do battle with the Sheriff
of Nottingham (Peter Cushing) and try to undo a plot to murder
the Archbishop of Canterbury (Jack Gwillim)... |
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Hammer
Studios had their first run in with the legend of Robin Hood in
1954's Men of Sherwood Forest. Directed
by Val Guest (The Abominable Snowman)
and starring American Don Taylor as Robin, it was a reasonable
success at the box-office. However, this 1960 production has nothing
to do with that film and takes its cue from the popular TV show
The Adventures of Robin Hood, starring Richard Greene,
which ran from 1955 to 1960. The show wasn't produced by Hammer,
but many episodes were directed by Terence Fisher — who was naturally
picked to direct this big screen continuation. On paper, it sounds
like a can't miss combination — there's a fine cast, location
photography in Ireland, Hammer's most renowned contract director
at the helm... and yet, miss it does. Big time. |
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Part
of the problem is producer/star Richard Greene. The Hollywood
veteran (The Hound of the Baskervilles,
1939) may have been popular on the TV show, but in the film he
comes off as a rather flabby and middle-aged (he would have been
in his early forties at the time of filming) man of action. Even
so, Greene brings ample charm to the character. He doesn't do
a bad job during less strenuous scenes, but when the action gets
going — and sadly, this doesn't happen nearly enough, but more
on that later — he looks like he's prone to getting winded far
too easily. Suffice it to say, he doesn't compare to the youthful
exuberance of Errol Flynn in the still-definitive The
Adventures of Robin Hood (1938). That said, as co-producer,
Greene exercised a lot of control over the project. It's clear
he was determined to make this a film suitable for all ages, and
in this respect it loses the edge that a company like Hammer may
have been able to give it. It's all too brightly lit, well-scrubbed
and impeccably manicured to come across as gritty or realistic,
and the violence is kept to a bare minimum. |
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While
Terence Fisher was a logical choice to direct the film, he doesn't
bring anything to the table this time. Fisher never developed
the ability to foster projects on his own, so he was prone to
accept work just to pay the bills — a perfectly understandable
and ordinary way of going about business, but one which sometimes
found him in charge of films with which he had little interest.
Having not seen his Robin Hood TV episodes, I can't comment
on their quality, but Sword displays
little of the flair or style seen in his Hammer horrors of the
same period. Continuity is sometimes laughably bad (check out
the scene with the spinning wheel — you'll know it when you see
it), and Fisher seems to have a difficult time utilizing the widescreen
framing — a surprise given that he had already used the 2.35 ratio
effectively in The Stranglers of Bombay
(1959). Much of the action unfolds in static wide and medium shots,
and there's only a handful of atmospheric set-ups (much of them
present in the interiors at the priory towards the end of the
picture). Worse still, Fisher seems at an absolute loss to handle
action scenes. Sword boasts some
of the most lethargic and halfhearted swordfighting you're ever
likely to see — not a good thing in a Robin Hood movie. Fisher's
gothic classics had bursts of inspired action choreography, but
here it's almost as if he was overwhelmed by the demands of the
project — or perhaps didn't care enough to try harder. The end
result is the worst film of the latter half of his career. |
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On
the plus side, the film has a fine supporting cast — but even
here, there are problems. No ambivalence need be voiced about
the immaculate Peter Cushing, who does a splendid job as the double-dealing
Sheriff of Nottingham. Cushing sometimes faltered in cold villainous
assignments, where his natural warmth seemed to be at odds with
the role he was playing (cf., The
Gorgon), but here he enters into the spirit of the thing
beautifully. Cushing is also one of the few actors in the film
who approaches his swordfighting with any real energy — he gives
it his all, even if his opponents sometimes seem to be fearful
of putting out their back by lunging too hard. It's difficult
to gauge Sarah Branch as Maid Marian; she's photogenic enough,
but her entire performance was looped by another actress. The
scenes of her clinching with the middle-aged leading man are a
bit awkward, but she's plucky enough when required. Imposing Nigel
Green (The
Skull) and rotund Niall MacGinnis (Curse
of the Demon) are well cast as Little John and Friar Tuck,
respectively, but the script and Fisher's direction let them down
rather badly. Green barely has a chance to register, and MacGinnis
is saddled with one of the phoniest-looking wigs and skull caps
in modern cinema; regrettably the staging makes no attempt to
draw attention away from this hideous monstrosity, and the end
result is that MacGinnis' efforts to be wryly amusing are upstaged
by his unconvincing appearance. Richard Pasco (Rasputin
the Mad Monk) fares well as the devious Earl of
Newark, but his coded-to-be-gay companion, Lord Melton, offers
a young Oliver Reed one of his most unfortunate screen appearances;
Reed affects a truly ludicrous high-pitched voice, and the script
is so intent on making him appear foolish that he can only skulk
about doing his damnedest not to look too ridiculous (it doesn't
quite work). Desmond Llewellyn ("Q" in the James Bond
films) makes a brief appearance, but he also appears to have been
dubbed for unknown reasons. |
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Cinematographer
Ken Hodges (The Shuttered Room) was
another holdover from the TV series, and one can only regret that
Hammer's ace cameraman, Jack Asher,
wasn't hired instead. It's not that Sword
is a bad looking film — but it is much too brightly lit, and though
the Irish countryside is naturally photogenic, Hodges fails to
elicit atmosphere. Beyond that, production values are sturdy enough.
Some of the sets are impressive, though Hammer's penny-pinching
sometimes makes things seem more cramped than they really needed
to be. |
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Arguably
the worst film of Hammer's "golden period" (1957-1962), Sword
of Sherwood Forest is for completists only.
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| Thanks
to the release of Ridley Scott's revisionist Robin
Hood (2010, with a similarly over-the-hill, but much more
imposing and fit, Russell Crowe), Sword
of Sherwood Forest makes its R1 DVD debut. Sony's transfer
looks superb. The 2.35/16x9 image is crisp, colorful and detailed
throughout. Edge enhancement is evident here and there, but overall
the film looks terrific. TV editions were panned and scanned,
making an already lethargic exercise downright intolerable; this
widescreen edition restores a sense of scope to the proceedings,
even if it still emerges as very weak tea indeed. Print damage
is negligible. The mono English soundtrack is full-bodied; English
captioning options are also included. Extras include a fullscreen
theatrical trailer and trailers for other Columbia releases distributed
by Sony. 5/17/10 |
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