Spanish Main, The (Blu-ray Review)
- Review Date: Feb 13, 2025
- Format: Blu-ray Disc
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Director
Frank BorzageRelease Date(s)
1945 (December 31, 2024)Studio(s)
RKO Radio Pictures (Warner Archive Collection)- Film/Program Grade: C+
- Video Grade: A
- Audio Grade: A
- Extras Grade: C+
Review
Pirate movies have been a staple of Hollywood since the silent days. Douglas Fairbanks (The Black Pirate), Errol Flynn (Captain Blood), Tyrone Power (The Black Swan), Geena Davis (Cutthroat Island), and Johnny Depp (the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise) have all appeared in movies about buccaneers of the sea. The Spanish Main, yet another pirate adventure, was the first picture filmed in Technicolor by RKO.
On its way to the Carolinas, a Dutch pilgrim ship is caught in a storm in the Caribbean and runs aground in Cartagena, a Spanish territory ruled ruthlessly by Viceroy Don Juan Alvarado (Walter Slezak, The Inspector General). A small party of pilgrims ventures ashore to request that the viceroy allow them time to repair their ship. Instead, he sentences them to indentured servitude. Upon learning of this, the ship’s captain, Laurent Van Horn (Paul Henreid, Now, Voyager), attacks Don Alvarado and is promptly thrown into prison. Van Horn conspires successfully with three fellow prisoners to escape, and they turn to piracy. Five years later, Van Horn is known as Barracuda, a fearsome pirate who targets only Spanish ships.
Contessa Francesca (Maureen O’Hara, The Quiet Man), daughter of the Viceroy of Mexico, has been promised in marriage to Don Alvarado and is sailing to Cartagena with her maid and the bishop who will perform the wedding ceremony. Francesca and Alvarado had never met, as was often the case among the high-born at the time, and she has no idea how unappealing the viceroy is in both temperament and appearance. Barracuda overwhelms the Spanish galleon carrying the Contessa and, as an act of revenge against Alvarado, threatens to marry her.
Francesca is torn between indignation and attraction to the pirate. She disdains Barracuda as a noblewoman should, but it’s obvious that she’s intrigued by his appearance, decisiveness, and rough charm.
Barracuda heads to Tortuga, a pirate colony where his old flame and fellow pirate Anne Bonney (Binnie Barnes, Angels With Broken Wings) makes her home. Bonney is jealous of the Contessa and their antipathy leads them to a duel with pistols. In the meantime, Barracuda’s men rail against their captain’s refusal to ransom the Contessa.
The Spanish Main is a routine pirate flick somewhat elevated by lavish color photography and superb use of miniatures to stand in for full-scale ships. The sea battles blend the miniatures footage seamlessly with studio-filmed action, making for exciting sequences.
A prologue establishes the basis for Van Horn’s transformation from honorable captain to the scourge of the seas but those missing five years makes us wonder how he gathered a full crew, a ship, and the daring to go up against the most powerful European nation at the time. Also, those pilgrims who were forced into servitude are never referred to again. What happened to them? And the role of the Contessa is merely an excuse to inject some romance into an otherwise testosterone-fueled film, though O’Hara makes the best of it.
While the script is both problematic and predictable, the film’s major flaw is the casting of Paul Henreid as Barracuda. This is a truly strange choice, since his best-known role prior to The Spanish Main was as the reserved and intellectual Victor Laszlo in Casablanca. One could easily imagine Errol Flynn or Burt Lancaster as Barracuda, but Henreid lacks the bravura and romantic flair that the role of a swashbuckler requires.
To make things worse, his co-star is the ravishing Maureen O’Hara, whose character is feisty, sharp-tongued, and assertive. She makes Henreid look soft and ineffectual, hardly the kind of man to command a group of renegade pirates or win the heart of a strong-willed lady.
One thing is certain: O’Hara and Technicolor were a match made in Hollywood’s dream factory heaven. Her brilliant red hair, blazing blue eyes, ruby lips and classic features, complemented by a glittering wardrobe and glowing make-up, literally light up the screen. Photographed by George Barnes, she gets the full glamour treatment and looks breathtakingly beautiful. When she’s on screen, it’s hard to look at anyone else. O’Hara would go on to play similar roles and is right at home amid the fights, melodrama, and romance.
Slezak does a lot of scenery-chewing as Don Alvarado in a stereotypical role as the resident villain, and Bonnie Barnes serves as contrast to the Contessa. Essentially “one of the men,” Bonnie is the antithesis of feminine, both in manner and dress. Seeing the Contessa in her confectionery finery, she naturally readies her claws for a showdown that turns out to be comical rather than tragic. Mike Mazurki (Some Like It Hot) plays Van Horn’s cellmate Erik Swaine, whose tongue was cut off by order of Don Alvarado and joins forces with him to escape the prison and pillage Spanish ships.
Director Frank Borzage renders John Worthing Yates’ screenplay with good action scenes but rather mundane performances. O’Hara gets by with her looks and attitude, but Henreid simply can’t live up to the script’s requirements and comes off more as a minnow than a barracuda. The miniature work is superior, with so many factors—movement of water, details of the ship, background, waves crashing on rocks, proper camera speed, the right setting of the wind machine—contributing to believability. In The Spanish Man, the effects team has nailed it, and it’s one of the picture’s best elements.
The Spanish Main was shot by director of photography George Barnes on 35 mm film with spherical lenses, processed photochemically by Technicolor, and presented in the Academy aspect ratio of 1.37:1. The Blu-ray is sourced from a 4K scan of the original camera negative. Clarity and contrast are exceptional, with the saturated Technicolor hues practically jumping off the screen. There’s considerable process photography showing the sea as background for studio-filmed sets representing the deck of Barracuda’s pirate ship. Miniatures of the various ships are unparalleled in films of the period, providing a sense of how these ancient ships maneuvered at sea for battle. Color palette is broad, ranging from the brilliance of Maureen O’Hara’s red hair and her elaborate costumes in primary hues to the more earthy tones at the pirate stronghold.
The soundtrack is English 2.0 DTS-HD Master Audio. English SDH subtitles are an available option. Dialogue is clear and distinct. Sound effects include cannon fire, a ship foundering in a squall, a pistol discharge, swords clanking, and ambient noise emanating from pirates taking control of the Spanish galleon. The score by Hanns Eisler is serviceable, but lacks the melodrama and adventurous spirit of action film music by Eisler’s contemporaries Max Steiner and Franz Waxman.
Bonus materials on the Blu-ray release from the Warner Archive Archive include the following:
- Movieland Magic (16:31)
- Buccaneer Bunny (7:30)
- Captain Hareblower (6:58)
- Theatrical Trailer (2:42)
Movieland Magic – This 1946 Technicolor short, directed by James Kern, features a quartet of starlets singing I Want to Be a Movie Star, about the demands of wardrobe fittings, still photography sessions, and long periods in make-up, as they undergo these studio requirements. A starlet performs an elaborate musical number, Springtime in Vienna, along with costumed actors who dance a waltz. This number turns into a jitterbug romp. Mel Torme appears as a singing studio guide, leading guests to the set of a colorful Mexican number that includes the Mexican hat dance and Flamenco dancers. Jane Wyman, costumed as dance hall girl in the old West, sings The Police Gazette. Other actors include Fuzzy Knight, Dennis Morgan, John Payne, and Scotty Beckett (as a child king). The short ends with the rousing production number In the Good Old American Way.
Buccaneer Bunny – In this 1948 Looney Tunes Technicolor cartoon directed by Friz Freleng, Bugs Bunny sees pirate Yosemite Sam burying his treasure. To protect it, Sam gets ready to shoot Bugs, but the rabbit outsmarts him. Sam chases Bugs all over the pirate ship but Bugs repeatedly takes advantage of Sam’s short temper. Eventually, defeated, Sam raises the white flag. Bugs dons a ship captain’s hat and paraphrases the words of John Paul Jones, “I had not yet begun to fight.” Voice characterizations are provided by Mel Blanc.
Captain Hareblower – Directed by Friz Freleng, this 1954 Technicolor Merrie Melodies cartoon is the third of three Warner Bros. shorts featuring Yosemite Sam as a pirate. Captain Yosemite Sam sees a trading ship nearby, moves his ship into position, and orders his quarry to surrender. The frightened crew obeys and abandons ship, but Bugs Bunny is aboard, dining on carrots, and refuses to give up. Bugs and Captain Sam battle each other in a duel, but Sam is easily bested by Bugs and incurs further physical damage at the hands of the crafty rabbit. Voice characterizations are provided by Mel Blanc.
The Spanish Main is light entertainment marred by a miscast leading man but aided somewhat by Maureen O’Hara, who looks glorious in Technicolor. The film offers only one bit of comic relief, and its otherwise serious tone gives it a textbook feel. A pirate film should contain more rum drinking, rowdiness, and pirate shenanigans. Despite the Technicolor photography and expert miniature work, director Frank Borzage couldn’t elevate the film beyond a handsome-looking B picture.
- Dennis Seuling