Sep 1, 2020
The Scarlet Blade (The Crimson Blade, 1963)
"Don't confuse a collaborator with a so-called traitor. One is a snivelling coward seeking to enrich himself or to save his own skin; the other may find himself ideologically disposed to change sides. Do you understand?"
"Every man has a reason for switching his allegiance. Only he can adjust the rights and wrongs of the matter to his own conscience."
#The Scarlet Blade#The crimson blade#hammer films#british cinema#films i done watched#1963#lionel jeffries#oliver reed#Jack Hedley#June Thorburn#Michael Ripper#Harold Goldblatt#Duncan Lamont#Clifford Elkin#suzan farmer#John Harvey#Charles Houston#Robert Rietty#Harry towb#Michael Byrne#John Woodnutt#john gilling#Another Hammer adventure film; another case of missed opportunity and needless racism. I mean this one is set in England?? During the civil#War?? Was there really any need to put Michael Ripper in brownface and an earring as a Romani bandit? The answer is no there's never any#Need for that of course. Otherwise this is fine: a decent intelligent script at least as far as dialogue is concerned but utterly without#Nuance. The king is good the royalists are good everyone else bad. Ollie Reed is in his young and hungry state and he's brilliant naturally#Lionel Jeffries is also great (he did serious roles so well it's almost a shame he ended up doing so much comedy) but the heroes are#Underwritten and underdeveloped. Some neat skirmishes and a one on one fight scene that goes on so long it passes the point of absurdity#But on the whole this is sadly forgettable. This was apparently Hammer's 100th film too. Where was Cushing? Where was Lee? Tut
