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Amid big-budget medieval pageantry, King Richard goes on the Crusades leaving his brother Prince John as regent, who promptly emerges as a cruel, grasping, treacherous tyrant. Apprised of England's peril by message from his lady-love Marian, the dashing Earl of Huntingdon endangers his life and honor by returning to oppose John, but finds himself and his friends outlawed, with Marian apparently dead. Enter Robin Hood, acrobatic champion of the oppressed, laboring to set things right through swashbuckling feats and cliffhanging perils!
'Twill not be long ere we storm the very castle itself.
Douglas Fairbanks pulls out all the stops and produces one of the most expensive films of the 1920s. Including a massive castle which is reputed to be the largest Hollywood set built for any silent movie. This was also the first motion picture ever to have a Hollywood premiere.
The first hour is mostly setup and an origin story, so there’s not much “Robin Hooding”…. But once the second half kicks in, this film takes off like a sprite green rocket with nonstop action, swashbuckling hijinks and a massive group of the merriest men you’ve ever seen.
The most striking part of this were the sets. Huge castles and grand forests made up most of the film, and they were of a scale that gave the whole thing an epic feel, even if it is was one of the slower Robin Hood tellings I've seen--until the last act. The last act becomes a huge, sprawling battle that would not be out of place in something Tolkienian, but without the orcs. The effects are all a bit basic, but the size of things made up for that remarkably.
That said, it's all spectacle and nothing more. The story focuses a bit more on Robin's time before outlawry, giving emphasis to his friendship with Richard. This is all well…
“Thus is it was that Huntingdon buried his yesterday. Here he began a new life - a life to be dedicated to revenge --bitter-- but joyous.”
Bitter but joyous...two words that could not better describe the ever-shifting tone of Douglas Fairbanks’s 1922 classic.
The film has its comedic--almost cartoonish--moments such as when Robin and his men joyously bonk Prince John’s guards over the head one-by-one as they exit a small door as if it were a clown car-- dumping their unconscious bodies head first into a shallow well.
These silly spectacles are juxtaposed by brutal scenes of torture. Prince John’s men ruthlessly lobotomize a man for slaying a wild boar in the King’s forest. The man’s wife and child watch…
I was surprised at how great this film was. It's a silent film, but it makes the story of Robin Hood feel epic. This interpretation spends the most time with King Richard and establishing his relationship with Robin and Prince John before he goes off the war.
Douglas Fairbanks wrote, produced, and starred in Robin Hood. I am impressed with how much he accomplishes when considering the period he made this. He introduces the audience to the Earl of Huntingdon as he jousts against his rival, Sir Guy of Gisbourne. Interestingly, so much time is spent at the king's court, where little time is given to establish how Robin Hood meets his merry men. We don't meet Robin Hood and…
Huge and magnificent production, epic spectacle as impressive as anything Griffith was doing. I was a bit surprised by some of the light-hearted silliness on display, though; Mr. Fairbanks doesn't seem to take his fight scenes any more seriously than Bugs Bunny would.
There's a bit of revisionism at work in the way the story is set up; an especial lot of care is taken to show that Robin Hood was acting as the King's surrogate, and that his outlawry was actually in accord with royal policy. I guess in those red-scare 1920s days, fearing subversives the way they did, it was important to show that these guerrilla-fighting forest dudes weren't Leninist Trotskyite anarchist Villista nihilists.
Me, I'm all for waves of subversion, but this was plenty of fun the way it was.
Fairbanks' greatest film - and my favourite Robin Hood movie - gets a rare big screen outing with the premiere of Neil Brand's rousing, euphoric and multi-layered new score, played by the BBC Symphony Orchestra, which mirrors the broad intrigue, tender romance and exultant, rampaging joy of this silent blockbuster.
Most of what you may know as the Robin Hood legend comes from Warner's 1938 film, starring Errol Flynn, which had to find more obscure episodes from the outlaw's story because the bulk of it (particularly his earlier life as the Earl of Huntingdon) were tied up in the copyright of this earlier smash. There's no duel with Little John or splitting-the-arrow here.
This version unfolds not with well-balanced chapters…
Simply incredible. This film is over 100 years old and completely knows how to entertain over a runtime of more than two hours.
With awesome set design a magnificent Fairbanks who really portrayed the first film Robin Hood in a way you could only love this film is a true gem. Fantastic pacing and Iloved the approach of the crusaders in the first hour like Ridley Scott also did a bit in his underrated Robin Hood film.
Maybe I’m simply too much in love with that storyline whereas I’ve only disliked one Robin Hood Film till yet.
"These lusty rebels only waited a leader to weld them into a band, an outlaw band destined to live immortal in legend and story."
It's long been my intentions to sit down and watch the 1922 Robin Hood starring Douglas Fairbanks. The sets and costumes were marvelous and they put together a pretty good film, especially for the silent era, but what kind of took me out of it, was the ragtime music that really didn't go with the action taking place on screen. It would be years still, until movies had sound, let alone scores, but it really makes you appreciate guys like John Williams, Ennio Morricone, Leonard Bernstein and other great conductors who's music is so poignent to…
A film so good they made a new one every decade. I've read that it was one of the most expensive films of the 1920s, and looking at the sets and costumes, it's not hard to believe it. Errol Flynn has been the blueprint for every Robin Hood film after that, but there would be no Errol Flynn without Douglas Fairbanks.
I have to compliment the excellent job on the sets and how big this movie feels. I also have to be honest, I was so bored during this one. I just really wanted to watch the one with the talking animals the whole time.
A different animal than the Curtiz helmed classic starring Errol Flynn & Olivia de Havilland. While the pleasure of watching the merry men lay waste to both Prince John's lackeys, and turn the tables on the tyrant, this version begins long before Huntingdon (Fairbanks ) is forced to don his forest garb and thwart the evil tax collectors. We get more background with King Richard, (Wallace Beery) Marian, (Enid Bennett) and the vile Prince John (Sam De Grasse) and his henchmen. Also, John is shown to be m ore devious and cruel than the 1938 version with Claude Rains. There are some wicked a cruel punishments handed out that are pretty graphic for 1922.
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