Against All Flags (1952)

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

This film is a swashbuckling "Captain Blood" style, in which the immortal heartthrob Errol Flynn plays a British officer who infiltrates a pirate den to undermine his coastal defenses and allow an English attack. Flynn is in a comfortable role and provides us with a performance within what we could expect from him. Next to him are Maureen O'Hara and Anthony Quinn, the latter in the role of the villain. Quinn had a relatively contained performance, despite his character being a bully. O'Hara seeks to establish himself in a middle ground between the feminine sensuality and the strength and personality that her character demanded. I don't know to what extent this effort was fruitful, but I believe the actress could have done better. In addition, being a period film and being piracy a strongly masculine activity, her character lacks verisimilitude. Worse than that is just Alice Kelley, in a character very stereotyped and loaded with subliminal sexual allusions. In short: its a film that satisfies swashbuckling connoisseurs but is far from the greatness of other films of this genre.

In his one and only film done for Universal Studios Errol Flynn plays a king's spy, an officer in the British navy sent to infiltrate the pirate lair on Madagascar and put their harbor guns out of commission. The head pirate Anthony Quinn doesn't trust him as far as he can throw a yardarm. But he does interest lady pirate Maureen O'Hara who is letting her hormones get control of her judgment.This was probably a script that was meant for Jeff Chandler and possibly Rock Hudson or Tony Curtis, but they were all probably occupied so Flynn got the nod, loaned out from Warner Brothers by Jack Warner.The story of Against All Flags has Flynn and two other crewman pretending to be deserters from a merchant ship and eager to join Quinn and fight as he put it Against All Flags, save the Jolly Roger. On one of the pirate raids the daughter of the Mogul of India played by Alice Kelley and her Scottish nursemaid Mildred Natwick. Only Flynn realizes who she is and that knowledge adds to his mission as he tries to keep her from harm's way. Kelley is a bit of a dim bulb and her failure to forget she's a princess puts the whole enterprise in danger.No one will ever mistake this pirate film for Flynn's screen triumphs in Captain Blood or my favorite Errol Flynn film, The Sea Hawk. No great production values went into this film, you can really recognize the phoniness of the sets to easily.As this was done tongue in cheek it gave the players a chance to indulge in a bit scenery chewing. Especially Anthony Quinn who digests a whole dining room set. Flynn gets by on his usual charm and O'Hara looks like a dominatrix in those skin tight thigh high boots she had to wear.Still Against All Flags is entertaining and the fans of the principal players will enjoy it.

I just finished a mini-marathon of Errol Flynn pirate movies: Captain Blood (1935), The Sea Hawk (1940), and Against All Flags (1952). Strangely, I'd never heard of AAF, though I knew most of Flynn's other films. It was interesting to see Flynn's face change so dramatically over the years, and listen to his accent become more American. I've never heard anyone mention this before, but I find that in his 40s, Errol Flynn looked a great deal like John Wayne. In fact, I had to blink more than once during AAF to remind myself that this was *not* John Wayne! I enjoyed this film, mainly thanks to the three leads, as others have said. I had read a previous review about how sexist this movie is, so I was prepared for the worst, but I didn't find it *that* bad (comparatively speaking), except for the stupid ending. The insistence of Maureen O'Hara's character that she will only kiss a man when she feels like it, instead of the other way around, her intelligence, confidence, honesty and her kindness to her "rival" all seem pretty feminist to me. On the other hand, apparently it's quite all right to sell the Indian princess's nine companions into marriage, as long as the princess herself is saved!Overall, though, I found this film more racist than sexist. The villain is once again the olive-skinned Hispanic (Anthony Quinn), and the "Indian" princess in her harem outfit (played by a white actress, naturally) is so stupid she shouldn't be allowed to cross a street by herself!I wasn't that thrilled by the sword-fighting, but that might be due to an overdose after watching three movies' worth! I don't know whether it was the soundtrack, but Errol Flynn spoke so softly throughout this film that often I had trouble understanding what he said. One little question: if you'd just stabbed someone, wouldn't the owner expect to see a little blood on his knife when you returned it to him? The technicolor shows to good advantage, and I'd like to know where they filmed the outdoor scenes! All in all, an enjoyable pirate movie for an evening's entertainment.

AGAINST ALL FLAGS, Universal's 'take' on the WB swashbucklers of the previous decade, utilized the services of the quintessential Warner buccaneer, himself, Errol Flynn, in the lead. While he was no longer the devil-may-care young matinee idol he'd once been, the actor, finishing up his WB contract, negotiated a 'percentage of the gross' deal to make the film, and with a potential big payday as incentive, Flynn would show more energy and enthusiasm than in THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE (which would be released a year later, and would be his last WB swashbuckler).As Brian Hawke, a British naval officer 'undercover' to destroy the batteries of a pirate island stronghold, Flynn looks far older and more jaded than in his halcyon days (when his commander refers to him as 'young', you can almost see both actors wince), but his rakish smile is still present, and his dialog is ripe with the sexual innuendo audiences had come to expect from a Flynn film (to female pirate Maureen O'Hara, he says, with tongue in cheek, "I'd looked forward to serving under you, ma'am"...). Posing as disgraced and discharged, his obvious refinement draws the suspicion of ruthless pirate captain Anthony Quinn, but stirs the long-suppressed sexual yearnings in O'Hara, whose father had built the artillery emplacements. Discovering that the plans are located in O'Hara's bedchamber, Flynn goes to work on her, combining his mission with his infamous off-screen reputation for seduction, in a funny scene that both actors play to the hilt.Placed under Quinn's command, Flynn participates in the capture of a galleon, then discovers that the 'cargo' is a virginal Indian princess (Alice Kelley), who'd never been close to a man before, other than her father. Having Errol Flynn as a 'first' provides another point of humor, as, after he gives her a platonic kiss, she nearly swoons, and begins incessantly begging, "AGAIN!" (A chant O'Hara would take up, as the film's final line).There is the 'mandatory' discovery of Flynn's true identity, O'Hara's betrayal to rescue him, and O'Hara and Kelly both held as hostage aboard Quinn's ship, leading up, of course, to a 'by-the-numbers' final swordfight between Flynn and Quinn. Unfortunately, in filming the final duel, Flynn fell, breaking his leg, and the production was halted until the aging actor could heal (Universal, ever conscious of budget, filmed YANKEE BUCCANEER, with Jeff Chandler, on the Flynn sets, as he recuperated). The shooting was, overall, a pleasant experience for Flynn, at a time when the WB had relegated him to 'B' pictures, and he advertised AGAINST ALL FLAGS in theatrical trailers as one of his favorite films. While it wasn't the hit he had hoped for, it did do well enough that the WB would 'green light' THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE, to be made in England. (Universal would remake AGAINST ALL FLAGS, 15 years later, as THE KING'S PIRATE, with Doug McClure in Flynn's role.)Financial difficulties would soon force Errol Flynn to leave the United States, and the pirate yarn would be his last film shot in America for five years.A new stage of his rollercoaster career was about to begin...