The Bandits of Corsica (1953)

A Masterpiece!

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

Bandits Of Corsica is a sequel to the Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. classic The Corsican Brothers where Fairbanks played a pair of noble Siamese twins separated at birth and brought up separately to conceal their identities. At the conclusion of the Fairbanks film one had died and the other had saved the day and won Ruth Warrick and inherited the family estate.I was looking forward to seeing a sequel as I had enjoyed The Corsican Brothers, but the premise was preposterous. Douglas Fairbanks,Jr. looked good and dead to me, but we find out that he did not really die. The twin roles now taken by Richard Greene has the dead twin unconscious for a long time and then waking up with no memory and now living with the gypsies. But the gypsies don't even know who their Greene really is.I mean really. The only ones who had resurrections like these are the Universal monsters like Frankenstein, the Wolfman, etc.In the meantime Corsica is facing a new tyrant. Raymond Burr with his aide and nephew Lee Van Cleef is bidding to take over the island and he'd like a governor generalship from the king. Burr and Van Cleef as always are excellent villains. All I can say is preposterous premise.

If you liked "The Princess Bride," you'll probably enjoy this movie.This is a must see for Richard Greene (Robin Hood) fans. He gets to play twin brothers Mario and Carlos. He is fine and dashing in both roles. Mario is his standard square jawed hero, but Carlos is a more flawed and complex character. He even gets to disguise himself as he often did in his Robin Hood television series, and play a third role as a gypsy fortune teller.The story reminds one more of Zorro than Robin Hood in style. The settings and combination of swords and pistols for fighting also gives it that Zorro feel.Raymond Burr is delightful as the villainous Baron. He is given nice support by Lee Van Cleef as his henchman. It is nice to see them both this youthful before they became stars in the 1960's.Paula Raymond and Dona Drake are the beautiful female companions of Richard Greene's brothers. This was the beginning of Paula Raymond's career before she became a staple of dozens of 1950's and 1960's adventure television shows. It is towards the end of songstress Dona Drake's movie career. Both are fine in rather small supporting roles.The movie moves quickly with lots of action scenes. It is just very well done and professional, albeit standard Hollywood entertainment in the 1950's.

OK, I'll do one. Typical early 50's swashbuckler that Columbia and Universal were so adept at doing although this one's a United Artists effort. Richard Greene plays the familiar (to fans of the genre) Corsican Bros. and does a creditable job. I like him more the more I see him. He's no great shakes, mind you, but is more than suitable for roles like this. I guess he's most well known as the TV Robin Hood in which there was just bit more talk, unfortunately, than action (as with most TV adventure shows). The pace is good, the sets better than expected (some of the exteriors looked filmed in Europe- maybe Mexico) and there was added pleasure in seeing Raymond Burr and Lee Van Cleef as bad guys #1 and #2, respectively. If what I've written perks the interest of fans of this sort of thing (and you know who you are) then it's certainly not one to miss. This version compares favorably- but does not come close to surpassing- the '41 version with Fairbanks, Jr.-In fact I'm almost certain that I detected a few clips from the previous version inserted into this one (which does no real harm IMO).