Director: Rouben Mamoulian
Cast: Tyrone Power, Linda Darnell, Basil Rathbone, Robert Lowery
Have I Seen it Before: Never. I feel really bad about this. In my defense, I eschewed
Did I Like It: It’s impossible to dislike a movie that is universally accepted as the direct, non-gun related inciting incident to Bruce Wayne becoming Batman. Especially after the semi-recent Antonio Banderas films (or, at least, one of them), it would be entire understandable if a modern audience were not able to get on board with the film. The performances are highly mannered, the film is shot with the resources of a B-picture of the time, and I don’t think I’d be out of line to say that Johnston McCulley The Curse of Capistrano has the disadvantage of being weighed down both by the restrictions of the pulp process and the fact that the full idea of the character hadn’t yet come together.
So, here’s where I ask: So what?
Is there a bit too much time spent on Don Diego’s (Power) trying to negotiate finding a wife among the Spanish Californian nobility? Sure. Do neither Basil Rathbone nor Power not quite convincingly shed their respective Basil Rathbone-ness and Tyrone Power-ness to play a members of that Spanish noble class? Also, yes, but if you’re going to get bent out of shape at every actor—especially the British—miscast as some other nationality, you’re going to have a real bad time when Anthony Hopkins comes on the scene, and you’re going to have an absolute hell of a time any time Sean Connery shows up in a movie*. All of that may be true, but if you can’t have a good time here, it’s entirely possible movies may not be for you, even if the original 1920 version, and the subsequent Banderas film (again, not both of them) might do the Fox more justice than is seen here.
* Thought I remembered this, and sure enough, after looking it up, Connery was on the short list for Don Diego in The Mask of Zorro. Could have called that one…