A Hollywood swashbuckler in Technicolor, set in the Spanish Main when the colonial conflict between Spain and Britain subsides, the infamous pirate Henry Morgan (Cregar) proselytizes himself and is made Governor of Jamaica, supplanting Lord Denby (Zucco), whose daughter Lady Margaret (O’Hara) catches the eyes of one of Morgan’s cronies, the valiant ex-pirateJamie Waring (Power).
Morgan’s ruling is undermined by both the obdurate Captain Billy Leech (Sanders) who refuses to relinquish his marauding vocation, and Lord Denby’s accusation of his incapacity of stopping Leech’s plundering. So Morgan mandates Jamie along with other two ships to arrest Leech, before embarking on the mission, Jamie spirits Margaret away on his vessel to sabotage her imminent wedding with an English gentleman Roger Ingram (Ashley), who turns out to be the one who keeps tipping Leech the wink of his assaulting targets.
There are involute political games teased but not plumbed, instead, the focal point shifts to the fire-and-water play between Power and O’Hara, the time-honored trope of a virile sea-farer overcoming the unseaworthy icy beauty, and both stars are magnificent to watch. But acting-wise, a burlyLaird Cregar’s uppity persona is a formidable force to match, and an almost unrecognizable George Sanders makes for a competent rival for his wiles and vigor, after all, he is the captain of the titular“The Black Swan”.
Action sequences are doled out unimpressively, but its florid, Oscar winning cinematography gives the film a congenial charm along with the cast’s can-do attitude, a run-of-the-mill commercial fare nonetheless, one must appreciate its yesteryear artistry, bobbing from every and each frame and shimmering with naiveté and alacrity.
referential point: Michael Curtiz, William Keighley’s THE ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD (1938, 7.2/10)
