Son of Fury: The Story of Benjamin Blake (1942)

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

An entertaining tale of Tyrone Power, cheated out of his birthright by the villainous George Sanders. Power becomes Sanders' ward, and Sanders beats and humiliates him. Power assaults him -- a grave offense, a commoner knocking a rich aristocrat around -- and barely escapes hanging by stowing aboard a sailing ship that brings him to a Polynesian island like Tahiti. There he meets the delicious Gene Tierney in a flowery two-piece sarong. Who could resist? When he's collected enough pearls to ransom a king, he returns to England, hires a lawyer who deposes Sanders, and assumes his rightful place as lord of the manor. Sanders is now a commoner himself, though still capable of a sly trick or two in his attempt to continue in the life style to which he's become accustomed. There is a brutal fist fight. Sanders fights dirty. All villains fight dirty in these scuffles. But Power wins, gives the manor to the servants and to his kindly grandfather. Then he takes off again, trading the corruption of civilization for the simple life among the noble savages, the sheltering palms, not to mention the sheltering arms of Gene Tierney. Jean-Jacques Rousseau can be heard faintly, applauding from just off camera.It's one of those tales we don't see much anymore, based on a sprawling, epic, now-forgotten novel. Nobody seems to have patience enough to read these long tales of adventure and romance. Maybe James Michener was the last of the breed.Tyrone Power is a passable adventurer, Twentieth-Century Fox's answer to Warner's Errol Flynn. He's aided considerably by Alfred Newman's heroic score, Twentieth-Century Fox's answer to Warner's Eric Wolfgang Korngold. Gene Tierney had little range as an actress, even though, as here, she was forced to be a sexy and naive native girl or, elsewhere, a dumb and hungry redneck. She's out of her depth. She needs to be in sleek clothes in New York, as she was in "Laura" and "Leave Her To Heaven." Best performance award goes to -- envelope, please -- yes, George Sanders as Sir Arthur Blake, snooty and sadistic aristocrat. He's never been a better cad. Oh, to see him sit at court, while Tyrone Power is humiliated and about to be sent to the gallows, and Sanders lolls back in his seat, looking down his nose like William F. Buckley, and rolling his eyes heavenward. The guy was great.

SON OF FURY is a great adventure movie with nary a sword in sight. Ben Blake (Power) is a stable boy who believes himself the rightful heir to the estate on which he labors. His nasty uncle (the delectable George Sanders) claims to be the rightful heir and beats and whips Blake with regularity. Nasty uncle's daughter (Farmer) secretly loves Blake, who ends up shipping out and eventually lands on a Pacific island full of friendly natives. There Ben meets and "weds" Eve (Tierney) and collects pearls. A lot of pearls. He returns to England and works to prove his claim to the estate. He then must face his nasty uncle one more time. Great character actors support Power and Sanders, including John Carradine as a fellow ocean voyager, Harry Davenport at Ben's grandfather and Dudley Digges as Ben's quirky barrister. Power is at the height of his fame, and the film closely follows the plotting of his 1940 masterpiece, THE MARK OF ZORRO. At one point, Power even dons a Zorro-style mask to disguise his identity at a ball, and it looks like some of the same sets were used. The film, while based on a novel, also liberally borrows from such classic fare as MASTER OF BALLANTRAE and Kidnapped. Producer David Selznick spared no expense on this one, even though it was clearly shot in California and unfortunately in black and white (although color sequences were said to have been used in its initial run). The lavish music matches the lavish doings. A must-see.

I enjoyed this film a lot -- Tyrone Power is absolutely in top form in the role of the title character, Benjamin Blake, a man robbed of his inheritance and accused of being a bastard by his father's brother, the villainous Sir Arthur Blake as performed in high style by George Sanders. From the very first scenes there's this strong animal quality to Sanders, who's depicted as an expert fistfighter and an extreme sadist. Power insists on maintaining his dignity throughout being treated by his uncle as a slave, but the movie loses me a bit when he falls in love with his uncle's daughter, who after all would be his first cousin. She's pretty much obviously worthless in the first place. Frances Farmer was handed the unenviable role and she does a good job with it. Gene Tierney is the real love interest in the film, somewhat ridiculously cast as a native island beauty. Tierney isn't much of an actress but this is one of those fortunate roles where she doesn't really have to -- she just lets her fantastic chemistry with Power do the talking for her. They even let her have the first half of the movie as a silent role essentially since her character can't speak English, and it does wonders for her.The movie's just stuffed full of fantastic character actors. Dean Stockwell plays the young Benjamin. Elsa Lanchester appears in an interesting early bit as a prostitute with a sense of pride. John Carradine has a fun appearance as the man who jumps ship with Power and dives for pearls on the island. Carradine looks awesome in the sailor costume, and he brings a world of pathos to this film, really convincing us that once he's discovered the island and the simple joys of life that he no longer wants to go back to civilization and be wealthy within the structures of that unjust society. Blake under the influence of the same kind of impulse as his friend comes back to society changed not only in the status of his wealth but in the diversity of his perspective. And happily, this makes the eventual conclusion seem fitting instead of contrived or convenient.John Cromwell's directing is nice for the way he frames every scene very firmly within its social or environmental setting. Like in the ballroom scene where Power woos Farmer, which represents his desire for the aristocratic lifestyle, the frame is full of ornament and movement when first we open and focuses on the intrusive figure of Power in his masquerade coming onto the scene. It's a very good movie, but if I had any complaint it would be to the lack of moral ambiguity of any kind of Power's character. There should have been more of an edge to his anger and his desire for vengeance, and that would have made his lust for the Farmer character more believable and the contrast between his younger and older selves more marked. But the movie has an agenda to present Power as a hero throughout the entire film, which damages the possibility for interesting character development. Power himself is capable of much more subtle acting, but he's also good enough or competent enough to basically drop such pretense in a film like this and lean on his strong charisma and presence to carry the film.

This is a pretty entertaining film that works pretty well due to decent writing and an excellent villain in the form of George Sanders. The film begins with a young boy being forcibly taken from his loving grandfather and the boy is made a stable boy for a rich baronet. It seems that this rich guy (Sanders) is actually the kid's uncle but instead of being kind, he treats the kid like dirt. The reasons are because the uncle wants to keep the family fortune for himself AND because something about his dead brother and his wife bother him so intensely that he wants to make their child's life hell. The boy is played by Roddy McDowell, but after the first 15 minutes or so, he is "Hollywood aged" and is played by Tyrone Power. Power is very good in the film, but a few macho scenes didn't seem all that plausible--especially after seeing his rather scrawny frame once he took his shirt off part-way through the film.Well, Power cannot stay at the manor to take the abuse forever, especially since the uncle seems intent on eventually killing him--beating him savagely and making up a story that Power attacked and tried to kill him! So, he runs off to sea and meets up with a friend, John Carradine --in one of his non-crazy or monster roles. Together they plan to jump ship, make their fortunes and return to England. Well, all this DOESN'T go exactly as planned and Power meets a beautiful native girl played pretty convincingly by Gene Tierney. What happens next I really don't want to divulge--it would spoil the film's many surprises. However, the film does have many twists and surprises--especially at the end and enough that it elevates this film above the norm and makes it very watchable--nearly earning it a score of 8.