Movie Review: Robin Hood (1991)

So you're probably already aware of Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves which is an entertaining but ultimately mediocre and hollow movie with a great soundtrack and a damn entertaining Alan Rickman performance.

But also released in 1991 was another Robin Hood movie. Directed by action veteran John Irvin and written by Sam Resnick and John McGrath. McGrath was a veteran TV writer but this is Resnick's only film credit on IMDB. The cast is full of veteran actors, but the biggest name a modern viewer will recognize is a young Uma Thurman in her Post-Baron Munchausen, Pre-Pulp Fiction early 90s period.

Robert Hode (Patrick Bergin) is the Saxon Earl of Huntington and friend Norman Baron Roger Dauguerre (Jeroen Krabbe). Things go sour when Sir Miles Folcanet (Jurgen Prochnow AKA the guy from Das Boot) arrives and arrogantly starts throwing his weight around. He's here to marry Dauguerre's niece Marian (Uma Thurman), but that's not why Robin rebels.

Much the Miller (Daniel Webb) is caught poaching and Robin stands up for him, preventing Sir Miles from blinding the peasant. During his trial, words get heated, pride gets insulted, and Robin punches his way out of the castle and becomes an outlaw with his kinsman Will Scarlett (Owen Teale). They hit upon the standard beats of the river fight with Little John (David Morrissey), the attempted thievery on Friar Tuck (Jeff Nuttall), Marian running off to join Robin disguised as a young man. All against the backdrop of Prince John's regency during King Richard's imprisonment.

So why is this “The Good 1991 Robin Hood movie?”

Tone.

It gets the spirit absolutely right. There's no way that an early 90s medieval movie would ever reach the joyful spirit of The Adventures of Robin Hood, but while the costumes and sets feature lots of browns and washed out lighting, the spirit of the movie is deeply earthy. Characters sing (not elaborate musical numbers, just little ditties as they go along). There's some swashbuckling. There's trick shooting. There are glimpses of historical awareness, though they muddle together All Souls' Day with the Lord of Misrule tradition that belongs to Christmastide or the Merry Men getting powerful Welsh longbows about a hundred or so years before they became truly dominant in English battle tactics.

These are legitimate mistakes, but there's an attempt at verisimilitude and not something so nakedly absurd as the Ewok Village or Celts or a Moor traveling the 12^th Century English countryside because he has a Wookiee life-debt like in Prince of Thieves.

Then there's the romance. Marian is great here as a strong-willed and very court-savvy young woman with a sharp tongue. She has no interest in Sir Miles, and is charmed by Robin's benevolence and hot-blooded heroics. Even when she goes tomboy, she's still a girl in disguise and not simply an action movie character with boobs. This Marian's actually kind of bad in a fight, but still manages to get some good shots in. Compare with Prince of Thieves Marian who starts off the movie showing off her sword skills but becomes useless in the climactic fight scene. 

Robin himself is great too. There's no “You killed my father/betrayed my King, I need revenge!” motivation. He's just a proud, hot-headed nobleman with a rigid sense of morality who commits to his actions. Not quite Erroll Flynn heroic, but definitely channeling him.

Jeff Nuttall's Friar Tuck is also interesting. Nuttall was a major figure in 60s counterculture and artistic movements with an anarchic streak. Here he plays Tuck as a thoroughly shady character: evicted from his monastery for murdering another friar, he now travels the countryside selling chicken bones as saints' relics. Its an interesting thought behind why a man of God would go around with a band of outlaws, but Tuck's postmodern shadiness contrasts hard with Robin's straightforward heroism.

Straightforward heroism is the order of the day here. Robin is good, Sir Miles is bad (but not “consorting with sorcery and trying to rape Maid Marian” bad), and the two spiral toward a deadly confrontation before a legitimately earned happy ending.

Besides Men in Tights, this forgotten little gem is the best Robin Hood movie made in the last thirty years or so. Highly recommended.


 

“Put him in the Tower of London! Make him part of the tour.”

RMWC finally delivers closure to my Robin Hood fixation in this entry (for the time being). Bringing up the rear is 1994’s Mel Brooks comedy Robin Hood: Men in Tights, a fairly obvious parody of Prince of Thieves from 1991. So, is it loving homage? Cutting parody? Long string of jokes about British accents and cross dressing? All of the above?

Plot
Robin of Loxley escapes from a Saracen prison in Jerusalem, swims all the way back to England (you heard me) and discovers that his home and lands have all been confiscated by the local authorities, who are also assholes to everybody else. Prince John and the Sheriff of Rottingham conspire to rule the kingdom, and Robin starts building a rebellion. Hilarity ensues for 104 minutes.

Characters
Robin of Loxley/Robin Hood: Cary Elwes channels the spirit (and tights) of Errol Flynn as a smug and swashbuckling Robin who’s not afraid of going for silly slapstick comedy. In appearance and attitude, he owes so much more to Errol Flynn than Kevin Costner, and I think that works in the movie’s favor. As a parody, an over-the-top template is usually a better way to go, and Elwes goes full burn. His arc is all about getting back to England and regaining honor for his family and brining the Sheriff and Prince down. Also, he wants to get in Marian's pants, no mean feat in this movie. Robin is my pick for the film’s badass for such modest feats as swimming all the way from Jerusalem to England, firing six arrows at the same time, and speaking with an English accent.

Ahchoo, son of Asneez: A young Dave Chappelle made his movie debut in this film. Obviously a parody of Morgan Freeman’s Azeem, he’s, shall we say, hip and with it, wearing pump sneakers and a backwards cap. Also, his father is Isaac Hayes in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo. Robin’s primary sidekick and first recruit.

Blinkin: Mark Blankfield is the already-blind servant of the Loxley manor, and an almost purely comic relief character (compared to poor ol’ Duncan).

Little John: Eric Allan Kramer in probably my favorite Little John of the three movies reviewed here. Goofy, strong as an ox, a little bit dim, but a stout follower of Robin’s when he finally joins up. Gets some great dialog, and the obligatory river crossing fight scene is parodied brilliantly here.

Will Scarlett O’Hara: Matthew Poretta as the Georgia-born knife expert. Will is Little John’s best friend and displays quite a lot of competence in the film, but out of Robin’s five man band, he gets the least dialog and/or stuff to do.

Rabbi Tuckman: Mel Brooks as a traveling rabbi and circumcision expert. A fairly small role, but a very funny one.

Marian of Bagel: Amy Yasbeck as the chastity belted Maiden, a situation that, shall we say, chafes her. Her desire is to find a man who can unlock her…heart practically defines her, and she pretty much falls for Robin at first sight when he strides into Prince John’s banquet with a wild boar over his shoulders in exactly the same way as Flynn carried in a deer. Aside from that and a section where she escapes the castle to warn Robin of an attempt on his life, she is very much the pretty, pretty princess type of character. But you know what, I don’t mind. For some reason, I liked her the most out of the three Marians looked at. It’s an elusive reason that- oh, wait. Redhead. That’s why.

Broomhilde: Megan Cavanagh as the stout serving woman of Marian’s with a thick German accent. The guardian of Marian’s virginity, she performs much the same role as Dot Matrix in Spaceballs. Which, yes, we’ve seen before, but its different enough to be funny.

Prince John: Richard Lewis plays John as a New York Jew, which is rather funny when you think about it. He’s okay in the role, but nothing particularly great. Mostly he sits around and complains about how much everything goes wrong. He does get some great dialog with the Sheriff & Latrine.

Mervyn, the Sheriff of Rottingham: Roger Rees plays the unfortunately named sheriff. Hamming up the screen as Robin’s villainous foil, the Sheriff is a cross between the Sheriff of Nottingham and Guy of Gisborne, except with a dyslexic streak.

Latrine (nee Shithouse): Tracey Ullman hams up the screen as the wizened old crone with a huge crush on Rottingham.

Don Giovanni: Dom DeLouise in a small role as a ridiculously Brando-esque gangster from Jersey called in to help solve the Prince’s Robin Hood problem.

Visuals (Direction/Effects)
Mel Brooks is a very good director. Here’s an example: The Opening Credits feature a group of soldiers firing flaming arrows. It’s a simple shot, but the lighting of it is inventive and catching (and the punch line isn’t until the end of the credits, so the image gets a chance to stand out on its own). Anyway, the trend continues of the visuals serving as willing partners to the comedy. The colors are also nice and bright, and the movie visually owes much more to 1938 than to 1991.

Of course, being a Robin Hood film, there has to be a climactic fight scene, which is a step above the one in Prince of Thieves, but nowhere near as good as in the 1938 film. Still, Elwes can swing a sword around pretty well, tossing off one liners with flair and an impish glint in his eye.

Writing
The team of Mel Brooks, Evan Chandler and J. David Shapiro handled the script here, and again, it owes so much of the movie’s tone to 1938 as opposed to 1991. The plot is quick, the jokes fast and normally solid (except for a few pop culture duds that haven’t really aged well: pump shoes? Home Alone?) The only real complaint I suppose I have is that there isn’t any real threat in the film. You never get the feeling that Robin’s in danger or that there are any stakes involved (compare to Spaceballs’ Mega Maid scheme or the various parts in History of the World that require a miracle to get out of).

Sound
The score by Hummie Mann is good and entirely appropriate, but just doesn’t stand up next to Korngold and Kamen. The movie also features a lot of songs, from Marian’s song, to the “Men in Tights” song recycled from History of the World Part I to Robin’s Nelson Eddy-esque serenade to Marian to the Sherwood Rap, which interestingly enough, serves the same expository purpose as the title cards in the ‘38 & ‘91 versions.

Conclusion
I do enjoy this movie a lot. It’s a solid comedy, and in spite of its parodic nature, actually a solid Robin Hood tale that is sleekly paced. It may not be Mel Brooks at his finest, but there is nothing wrong with Mel Brooks in good form instead. Absolutely recommended.

“I had a very sad childhood, I'll tell you about it sometime. I never knew my parents; it's amazing I'm sane..”

Well, after viewing The Adventures of Robin Hood, I suppose it was inevitable that I would next turn to 1991’s controversial (in that a lot of people hate it) Kevin Costner flick Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. However, there is one caveat. I am not watching the original theatrical cut, but rather the two-disc extended version (which comes in a rather nice package from Warner Bros. in a similar setup to the 1938 Robin Hood film, which I have to admit, is a nice touch on WB’s DVD department).

Plot
A prison break in the Jerusalem leads to two unlikely allies heading to England, where our hero of noble blood discovers that his father has been killed and lands confiscated. Outraged at this, and at the treatment of the people around him by the local authorities, he becomes an outlaw, vowing vengeance and trying to get in the pants of an old childhood acquaintance. He moves to the woods to have ADVENTURE! for 155 minutes in the extended version.

Characters
Robin of Locksley/Robin of the Hood: You know, for as much crap as Kevin Costner’s accent in this film gets, its honestly not that horrible. Anyway, Robin in this film has broken out of a Muslim prison in Jerusalem after getting caught while on crusade with King Richard. He’s apparently been somewhat estranged from his father (a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo from anthropomorphic personification of Caps Lock, BRIAN BLESSED) and was a jerkass as a kid. On his return, he’s a humbled man, seeking justice against the wrongs he sees going on. However, the movie cheats at character growth, because we only see him as he is now, not how he got there, and the only real arc he has, deciding to protect Marian and become and outlaw, gets settled pretty quickly. Robin also has a distinct lack of IMPUDENCE in this film, being rather more low key in this film.

Azeem: It is a strange habit that modern filmmakers insist on inserting token minorities into period films taking place in homogenous regions in homogenous times. Still, that can be forgivable if the token minority character is played by Morgan Freeman. Freeman brings a gentle charm to the Moor, Azeem, who has sworn a debt to save Robin’s life just as Robin saved his, following him all the way to England to achieve that goal. The character is rather likable, except that he’s written as some kind of Wonder Moor, able to perform a cesarean section without any prior experience and to fashion a telescope some 400 years before their invention. Also, he has a ridiculously oversized scimitar that makes the historian in me sigh bitterly.

Little John: British character actor Nick Brimble in a big fake looking beard. A jolly sort of fellow, and a family man with eight kids. Aside from the family man angle, he’s the standard “big guy” role that usually ends up around Little John.

Lady Marian Dubois: Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio as Maid Marian (oddly enough not Fitzwalter in this film). She is very attractive and is ultimately a faux action girl, with only her debut as an example of her swordfighting skills. After that, she's straight up helpless for no reason. She knew Robin back when he was a childhood asshole, and grows impressed by Robin’s changed heart. Her brother died in Jerusalem, aiding Robin’s escape. She was okay, but her character didn’t have anything terrific to make her stand out against other Marians.

Will Scarlett: Now this is interesting. Christian Slater plays Will off as an angry young man and, along with Little John, as one of the leaders of the Sherwood outlaws that Robin stumbles upon. As soon as Robin stands up to lead the crew, Will is in his face, calling him out and generally acting like an ass to him. Turns out he has some very personal reasons to dislike Robin of Locksley that get revealed later on. I was personally impressed by the character in this since Will Scarlett is routinely neglected in various treatments of the legend, like in the 1938 version.

Friar Tuck: Who’s Line Is It Anyway? veteran Michael McShane appears rather late in the film, but boy howdy does he make an entrance. McShane plays the fat friar as an unapologetic boozehound, hamming up the screen whenever he opens his mouth. Interestingly enough, he gets an arc about how much Azeem’s religion bothers him, but the two eventually become bros.

Duncan: Walter Sparrow plays the blinded Duncan. Poor, poor Duncan. Blinded because of his loyalty to BRIAN BLESSED (not a metaphor), later in the film he manages to ride to Robin with a waning about Marian, only to die…for some reason. It wasn’t like he was shot or anything, he just died.

Guy of Gisborne: Michael Wincott is the thuggish Gisborne, a pale shadow in comparison to Basil Rathbone. An oily, loutish, marble-mouthed goon for the real villain, he proves to be quite incapable of halting Robin’s aggressions.

Mortianna: Well, here’s a new one: an old, crazy eyed crone who lives in a flooded basement and keeping up the Old Ways of pagan gods and blood sacrifices. She’s a scheming, evil creature with prophetic visions and is the advisor of...

The Sheriff of Nottingham (George): Alan Rickman is your Badass for today. Playing the Sheriff as the Villain, he steals every scene, then chews it up as a gloriously evil, scheming bastard. Dressed in all black at all times, long hair, goatee and just a filthy, lecherous cur of a man, he gets the lion’s share of interesting characterization and dialog (I’ll cut out your heart with a spoon!). I can say with full confidence that he is the absolute best character in the movie.

Visuals (Direction/Effects)
Let’s see, directed by Kevin Reynolds. A look at IMDB show him to be also the director of Waterworld. Hmm. Anyway, the movie is shot on location in England, which is a very nice touch that adds to the scenery. The cinematography is also quite nicely shot, although Reynolds does have a curious habit of shooting close ups of people at all times when they’re talking.

One thing I will fault the movie on is the pacing. I know I’ve got the extended cut here, but the added scenes are mostly focused on the Sheriff, which are great and fit in nicely with the rest of the narrative. The overall nature of the story is, well, sluggish in a lot of places. When Robin & his men set up shop in Sherwood and build their own Ewok Village, the narrative grinds almost to a halt. Its not that the scenes individually were bad, but that added together, it was altogether too much sitting around and talking that made me start to get fidgety on my couch.

And speaking of Ewok Villages, what the hell? Robin Hood builds an Ewok Village in Sherwood Forest. On the Silly/Awesome Scale, I’d have to say that it leans rather a bit toward silly. The fight scenes are also a little lackluster, particularly the Battle of Endo-, er, Sherwood Forest and the final duel. Its not that Costner and Rickman don’t try in their climactic fight scene, its just that you can tell they’re actors much more so than swordsmen, and the fight, while not awful, is much clunkier than the Flynn/Rathbone duel. However, the shot where Robin shoots a flaming arrow right at the camera? Bloody brilliant.

Writing
The script by Pen Densham is largely competent. Dialog isn’t normally painful and the concepts added to the legend (Robin coming back from Crusades to find his father dead, the presence of a Moor in England, the witch woman, Will Scarlett’s character development, etc) are all quite interesting in their own right. I was even able to turn a blind eye to most of the historical inaccuracies, except for the Celts. That’s where I draw the line. Why in hell were there Roman-era Pagan Celts running around in Sherwood Forest attacking the Ewok Village? There is so much wrong with that sentence that I can’t even think about it without a headache. I don’t even feel like ranting about it. Just do some research on your own, Wiki it or whatever, and imagine it reworded into my narrative voice.

Sound
Ah, now here’s something I can heap great big dollops of praise onto. Michael Kamen’s score is a rousing supply of ADVENTURE! in the grand old tradition of Hollywood. I don’t care if I get hell for this or not, but I think it compares nicely to Korngold’s Oscar winning soundtrack for the 1938 version. Kamen’s score may not be quite as perfect, but it’s a close second. The only thing that yanked me out of the musical side of things was the Bryan Adams song that played over the end credits. Its not that I don’t like “Everything I Do” but its just so strange to hear an early 90s ballad at the end of something that had until just then been filled with classically orchestrated ADVENTURE! music.

Conclusion
Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves is an interesting movie when you get down to it. It tries some interesting experiments with the Robin Hood mythos. It also tries to add some modern gritty drama while still nodding heavily back to the ADVENTURE! of yore. Pacing issues (and those stupid, stupid Celts) aside, its an enjoyable movie. If you’re a Robin Hood fan, of course this should be on your list. Also see it for some beautiful English scenery, for the film actually giving a lot of face time to Will Scarlett, but above all, see it for Alan Rickman’s Sheriff of Nottingham. That alone would be worth your while. Recommended, but with the understanding that there is a better Robin Hood film out there.

“I live in the forest with a few score good fellows who’ve everything in life save spiritual guidance.”

Now, a lot of the stuff I’ve been viewing at RMWC Headquarters has been made in the last thirty or so years. There are a couple of reasons for that. 1) Nostalgia for things I saw in my youth and/or for films that were made in that time period. 2) Price point. As much as I’d love to get a nice copy of Casablanca, the used video stores I frequent don’t get in copies of classic cinema often (or at an affordable price), but I will seek to view the classics at first opportunities. A boxed set of the Thin Man movies I’m looking forward to in particular.

That said, the Robin Hood story has been one of the cornerstones of my formative years. Not as much as the King Arthur legend, but the denizens of Sherwood Forest have been a part of my imagination since I saw the animated Disney version back when I was around seven. This review isn’t about the Disney version, but instead about the universally accepted granddaddy of Robin Hood films: the 1938 Errol Flynn vehicle The Adventures of Robin Hood, presented in GLORIOUS TECHNICOLOR!

Plot
I am going to pretend that this film takes place in an alternate history of England, one where King Richard actually liked the place, didn’t spend all of his free time in France and said that he’d sell London if he could find a buyer. Ok, see, the historian in me is placated.

The film begins with the people of England discovering that King Richard, on his way back from the crusades, has been captured by Duke Leopold of Austria. The king’s brother, John, usurps the regency of the kingdom, effectively taking charge and heavily favoring the Norman upper class nobility over the Saxon lower class. One Saxon noble, Robin of Locksley, takes serious offense to this, and impudently vows to make John and his lackeys suffer for their misdeeds. ADVENTURE! and IMPUDENCE! ensue for 102 minutes.

Characters
Robin of Locksley/Robin Hood: I usually like saving the film’s baddest badass for last, but when it’s the main character, I’m okay with exceptions. Errol Flynn’s Robin Hood is called “impudent” so many times that he becomes the living embodiment of it. Impudent, according to dictionary.com means offensive boldness, insolent or impertinent. Robin is all of these in spades. He storms into a feast Guy of Gisbourne is having for Prince John, dumps a deer carcass on the table, sits down and talks trash to the Prince until he has to fight his way out of the castle. Before recruiting Friar Tuck, he harasses the clergyman by both pranking him awake and then making Tuck carry him across a river on his back. It would be difficult to explain everything that makes Robin such a tights-wearing badass in this film, but it can be accurately summed up by calling him a magnificent bastard.

Lady Marian Fitzwalter: Olivia de Havilland plays a Norman noblewoman, the ward of King Richard, but under John’s current care. Marian is beautiful, but starts the film off as kind of an ice bitch. She doesn’t take kindly to Robin’s IMPUDENCE at the feast and only starts to like him when the merry men kidnap Gisbourne’s baggage train (with Gisbourne and Marian with it). She sees what Robin’s really fighting for, and it softens her up.

Prince John: Claude Rains brings a sophisticated weaseliness to the role of John. A cold blooded schemer who surrounds himself with men who will do the dirty work for him, he is the film’s real villain.

Sir Guy of Gisbourne: Basil Rathbone is the local lord who rules Nottinghamshire, Surprisingly enough, he’s much the impotent villain throughout the movie. Sure he glowers with the best of them, but he doesn’t really score any points for getting anything done. Most of his scenes with Robin Hood before the climactic fight scene are about trying to Hate Robin to death. Still, that climactic fight scene is quite epic, and Rathbone & Flynn get major points for doing most of it (aside from a few dives) themselves. It is among the great epic swordfights, and guess what? No slow motion laziness.

The Sheriff of Nottingham: Melville Cooper is the bumbling fool to Rains & Rathbone, the comic relief to their villain trio. He actually gets villain points for coming up with the idea to hold an archery tournament to capture Robin Hood.

Little John: Now, when I saw that Alan Hale was playing him, I thought, “no shit, the Skipper’s in this?” Well, no. Turns out it was Alan Hale Sr., the FATHER of the Skipper, though you can see the family resemblance. Aside from that, he’s an early recruit and probably the only one who bested Robin Hood in a fight.

Friar Tuck: Your standard Friar Tuck stuff; chubby friar, gets recruited, helps out. Turns out he’s a decent swordsman in this film and actually he & Little John become bro’s.

Much the Miller’s Son: A dumb peasant caught poaching deer on royal lands. Rescued by Robin Hood’s IMPUDENCE and one of his most stalwart recruits. He’s a comic relief character that didn’t do much for me and came close to irritating me at places.

Will Scarlett: Wears bright red, always by Robin’s side in big group shots, has a lute. That’s the extent of his characterization.

Visuals (Direction/Effects)
Two directors listed for it. William Keighley was the first, until he was booted off the picture, Michael Curtiz was brought in to finish things off. Filmed in California in Glorious Technicolor, the movie pops off the screen vividly. It is hyper-theatrical, but its done so exuberantly that it works. In some ways, the costumes look a lot like the kind of clothing that appears in manuscripts from the middle ages. How accurate it is to actual peasant dress, I’d say is pretty weak, but as far as the fancy pants nobles go, well, they liked dressing up in bright, pretty colors. While the movie chooses interesting visuals over gritty realism, I have to say, watching the explosion of colors in a medieval film is a welcome breath of fresh air from the bukakke of brown in more modern takes on legendary heroes. Yeah. I said it.

The action scenes are great, and there are a great many of them. The swordplay is of the theatrical kind, but even that’s an art form in itself, and the climactic fight is one for the ages, including some nice silhouette scenes (that have been copied by other movies since). Moreover, the archery stunts were all real, including the famous “splitting an arrow in the bull’s-eye” and performed by a master archer.

Writing
I can’t really blame the team of Norman Reilly Raine and Seton I. Miller for being a part of the King Richard the Lionheart cheerleading squad. The legend of Robin Hood has pretty much always been a PR spin machine for Rich. Besides, the movie more than makes up for it with awesome banter, fantastic pacing, and the sheer IMPUDENCE of Robin Hood. Even in his classic love scene with Marian, he’s a cocky bastard, and its outstanding.

Another thing the movie does is use text cards to bridge gaps between events. It’s fallen out of favor in recent times, but I think having a brief moment of text is a great way of maintaining the pacing by skipping over the boring stuff with a recap. The regent that Prince John kicks out, Longhcamps? He exists only in those recap cards.

Sound
The sound effects are fine, but the real winner here is the score by Erich Wolfgang Korngold, which is a stirring piece of ADVENTURE! music. Korngold was one of the prolific golden age Hollywood composers, and the score for The Adventures of Robin Hood is a fine example of one of the masters of the form.

Conclusion
This movie really delivers on the title. It features ADVENTURE! and Robin Hood. The Adventures of Robin Hood is one of those gems of classic cinema that lives up to they hype I’ve read and actually impressed me with its staging, pageantry, wit and downright IMPUDENCE! Its rightly regarded as the gold standard of Robin Hood films, and the other films in the genre are going to have their work cut out for them.