PHANTOM EMPIRES
  • MOVIES
  • OLD TIME RADIO
  • US TV
  • UK-TV
  • MOUNTIE PULP!
  • BOOKS
  • ARTISTS
  • ALMANAC
  • My Fiction
  • contact

Under Two Flags (1936)  Happy Birthday, Ronald Colman!

2/9/2016

2 Comments

 
Picture
I did a review of the fantastic Foreign Legion film WE'RE IN THE LEGION NOW (HERE) a while back,  and it was so fun that I thought I'd do another one.  Today being Ronald Colman's birthday,  it seemed like a good 'two-bird + stone' choice to take a look at the incredibly fun and well-cast UNDER TWO FLAGS,  where Colman shares the screen with the burly Victor McLaglen and the two lovely actresses, Claudette Colbert and Rosalind Russell.  I'm (like most thinking people) a huge fan of Ronald,  a fan of Foreign Legion stories (also of Colman's silent legion masterpiece BEAU GESTE) and it's his birthday,  thus, is a great excuse to write!

UNDER TWO FLAGS is a 1936 production,  based on the novel of the same name by English writer Maria Ramé,  known by her nom de plume Ouida.  Ouida was a great writer of adventure novels,  many of them Orientalist swashbucklers,  and UNDER TWO FLAGS is quite that.  It shares it's fame with her wonderful 1872 novel,  A DOG OF FLANDERS.  UNDER TWO FLAGS is without a doubt her most famous novel,  having been produced as a stage play,  and four film adaptations, in 1912, 1916 (featuring the smouldering 'vamp' Theda Bara), 1922, and this Colman version.  I've read the novel in one of my several Ouida bursts,  and it's a wonderfully written and colourful taste of pre-pulp pulp fiction.

In the film Victor (in the novel Bertie Cecil) honourably takes the rap for a crime actually committed by his brother.  He takes off in a dash,  joining up and becoming a sergeant in the French Foreign Legion.   Dapper and handsome,  Victor attracts the attentions and affections of the pixie-like French barmaid "Cigarette" played with almost punky spunk by Colbert.  Sadly for Cigarette,  Victor only has eyes for the luminous aristocrat Lady Venetia,  played by Rosalind Russell.  Well,  this doesn't sit well with Sgt. Victor's commander, Victor McLaglen's Major J.C. Doyle.  The gruff Doyle is unrequitedly smitten with the impish Cigarette,  and this puts him and our debonair Sergeant on the opposite sides of a potentially dangerous divide.

Will this love triangle doom the Legion in the face of an onslaught of fierce Arab tribesmen?!?

This was an amazingly pleasurable experience.  Colman (looking quite a bit like Michael Kitchen at times) was at his best here,  with a glint in his eye and exuding charm in every frame.  Colbert was lovely,  and though she came across as mildly irritating initially,   I had the  appropriate fondness for Cigarette by the end of the film.  Victor McLaglen was both 'charging-bullish' and charming,  looking quite the big brute in this one,  and Rosalind Russell was every bit the beautiful lady.  Also in the cast was Fritz Leiber Sr. (father of the sci fi writer),   Thomas Beck (from a number of Charlie Chan and Mr. Moto films),  Nigel Bruce, Gregory Ratoff (director of the 1960 OSCAR WILDE), Herbert Mundin ('Much' from Errol Flynn's THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD), and John Carradine.  With a  crisp script and a great cast,  and with solid  direction by Frank Lloyd (THE LAST COMMAND and BLOOD ON THE SUN),  it's a rollickin' good time.  The 1930's had so many of this kind of exuberant adventure,  and the more I see, the more I love this wonderful decade.  Also,  I'm a fan of this sort of Orientalist adventure,  and this is another in my effort to document these 'wild, wild East'-type movies.

It's a perfect thing to celebrate Ronald Colman's birthday!

2 Comments
    Picture

    RSS Feed

    Latest Reviews
    (click to visit)

    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture

    Classic Movie Blog Hub Member

    MOUNTIE FILMS.pdf
    File Size: 73 kb
    File Type: pdf
    Download File

    Here is my (ever-growing) list of Mountie movies and serials!  Enjoy!

    Upcoming Events


    Cool Blogs
    STALKING MOON
    Classic Film & TV Cafe'
    MOVIES SILENTLY

    CAFTAN WOMAN
    RIDING THE HIGH COUNTRY

    SILVER SCREENINGS
    SHADOWS & SATIN
    SPEAKEASY
    LAURA'S MISC. MUSINGS
    LADY EVE'S REEL LIFE
    They Don't Make 'em Like they Used to
    SILENTOLOGY
    Pre-Code  Film
    SILVER SCENES

    Thrilling Days of Yesteryear

    Mike's Take on Movies

    THE LIST

    All
    13 Assassins
    15 Post 1979 Films
    5 Films
    9 Hours To Rama
    Adventures Of Tartu
    A Heidi 2-Fer
    Alan Ladd
    Al Pachino
    A Man Called Horse
    Anthony Hopkins
    A Patch Of Blue
    Audie Murphy
    A Yank In Libya
    Barrymore
    Barry Sullivan
    Basil Rathbone
    BIRTHDAYS
    BLOGATHON
    Bogdan Stupka
    Breezy
    British Empire
    Buck Jones
    Buffalo Rider
    Caesar The Conqueror
    Cameron Mitchell
    Caryl Of The Mountains
    Chambara
    Chinatown
    Cisco Kid
    Claudette Colbert
    Cliff Edwards
    Clint Eastwood
    Colossus: The Forbin Project
    Come Next Spring
    Cowboy Motorcycles
    Dana Andrews
    Dan Haggerty
    Deborah Kerr
    Dick Powell
    Django
    Duncan Reynaldo
    Dustin Hoffman
    Eleanor Hunt
    Errol Flynn
    Faye Dunaway
    FILM BLOGGERY - Notes
    Foreign Legion Films
    Fort Vengeance
    Francis Sullivan
    Francis X. Bushman Jr.
    Franco Nero
    Fred Williamson
    Gary Cooper
    Gene Hackman
    George Hilton
    Giants Of Rome
    GLADIATORS SEVEN
    Go-Get-em Haines
    Gregory Peck
    Guy Rolfe
    Haldane Of The Secret Sevice
    HAMMER FILMS
    Harry Carey Jr.
    Harry Houdini
    HEART OF THE NORTH
    Hollywood Chess
    Horst Buchholz
    Humphrey Bogart
    Jack Nicholson
    James Craig
    James Oliver Curwood
    Jim Brown
    Jim Kelly
    Jimmy Stewart
    John Carradine
    John Huston
    Johnny Mack Brown
    John Wayne
    Jose Ferrer
    J. S. Casshyap
    Kay Lenz
    Ken Maynard
    King Of The Khyber Rifles
    KITOSCH
    Lee Van Cleef
    Leslie Howard
    Little Big Man
    Lon Chaney
    Love Affair
    MASSACRE TIME
    Mountain Man Movies
    Mountie Films
    MRS. MIKE
    My Man Godfrey 1957
    Nicholas & Alexandra
    NO!
    Nomads Of The North
    NORTHERN PURSUIT
    North West Mounted Police
    Northwest Rangers
    Oliver Reed
    Orientalism In Film
    Overland Red
    Peplums
    Pimpernel Smith
    QUO VADIS
    Rasputin & The Empress
    Reginald Denny
    Richard Harris
    Richard Harrison
    Rin-Tin-Tin
    Robert Donat
    Robert Morley
    Robert Ryan
    Ronald Colman
    Roy Rogers
    Sabotage Agent
    Serpico
    Shirley Temple
    Sidney Poitier
    SILENT FILMS
    Spaghetti Western
    Stranglers Of Bombay
    Take A Hard Ride
    Talbot Mundy
    Taras Bulba
    The Black Watch
    THE CANADIANS
    The Cossacks
    The Hunting Party
    The Life And Death Of Colonel Blimp
    The Mad Doctor
    The Prisoner Of Shark Island
    The Scarlet Pimpernel
    The Trap
    The Two Jakes
    Tim McCoy
    Tom Baker
    Tom Mix
    Top Ten Cowboys
    Tyrone Power
    Ukulele Ike
    Under Two Flags
    Victor McLaglen
    Warner Baxter
    We're In The Legion Now!
    Western Films List
    Westerns Through Time
    When Eight Bells Toll
    William Boyd
    Worst Film Accents
    Yankee Clipper
    ZARDOZ
    Казаки

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.