‘The Adventures of Robin Hood’ or — Putting The Motion in Motion Pictures?
ZING! THRRRRWHUMP! ZAP! POW! Is that the sound of arrows shooting through the air or is it the noise Errol Flynn makes in motion, a man so dynamic he sounds like that even when sitting down? Or it could just be my heart-rate whilst watching what could be the most entertaining movie ever made?
I’d never seen ‘The Adventures of Robin Hood’ (1938) until last night but my friend had always told me the movie was a lot of fun, an utterance I now realise might qualify as the biggest understatement of 2020 as not only is ‘Robin Hood’ a movie consisting entirely of undiluted fun but I didn’t even think it was actually possible to make them this enjoyable. It felt almost illegal. By the end I didn’t know whether I needed a lie down or if I wanted to watch it immediately again. I watched it immediately again.
You know the story — King Richard has been captured on his holidays so his evil brother John attempts to seize the crown and the only man standing up to this usurper is Robin of Locksley, that’s when Robin’s not hosting massive carvaries at his bachelor pad in the woods. There’s incident and high-jinks, sword-fights, flying arrows, romance, last minute rescues, evil schemes, foiled plans and thrilling chases. It’s relentless and breathless and possibly one of the fastest moving pictures I’ve seen.
It’s also one of the prettiest pictures as this movie is mind-blowingly gorgeous. What with the vibrant Technicolor cinematography, colourful design and insanely bright green and red costumes it’s like watching a load of boiled sweets fighting each other. The result is that ‘The Adventures of Robin Hood’ looks more like a cartoon than the actual Disney animated version, and certainly has more energy and lustre. Indeed, it has a similar look to Disney’s ‘Sleeping Beauty’ (1959), one of the best looking films ever made and which it must have inspired, with its use of shadows, deep blacks, sense of scale, balance of colours and use of vertical lines. This movie is so beautiful it sometimes makes ‘The Wizard of Oz’ (1939) look drab.
But it’s more than just prettiness as Michael Curtiz and William Keighley direct the hell out of this film giving all this overwhelming aesthetic an incredible amount of energy, where nothing is wasted and every moment, every move, has meaning and pressurised excitement. For example, take the scene where Guy goes to Marian’s chambers because he suspects she’s overheard their evil plan and Marian has just hurriedly hidden her warning letter to Robin in a box on her table. Guy comes in, questions Marian and knows the letter is inside the box simply by one, quick glance of Marian’s eyes. The entire bit of business is done in seconds and the whole film rattles along at this dizzying pace, a dizzying pace only amplified by Robin himself.
This is because Errol Flynn’s Robin Hood only exists in two distinct and discreet states of being — either perfectly at rest or BANG! moving at light-speed. There’s no state of transition, no acceleration or build-up; just total rest or pure motion. One moment he’s sitting back in his chair with smug nonchalance then a nano-second later he’s ZING!… and away he goes!!!
Robin is nothing but pure vitality, as though Lady Marian’s animus has jumped out of her psyche and is uncontrollably leaping about the place. Is this why Marian falls in love with him? But the actual sex is happening between Marian’s er… lady in waiting?, Bess and one of Robin’s merry men who, being physical creatures, can indulge in the relatable and tactile benefits to love whilst Marian and Robin vibrate on some ridiculously high, possibly non-corporeal, frequency. Apart from at the end when as soon as they realise they’re married and can now fuck Marian and Robin immediately dash off as soon as the vows are over to do exactly that. So quickly, in fact, that I suspect they’re actually in the process of doing it as the words ‘The End’ come up.
All the action is excellent with the archery fight near the start reminding me of the Mines of Moria bow-and-arrow skirmish in ‘The Fellowship of The Ring’ (2001) and there were countless moments where if you swapped the longbows for ray guns you’d be watching ‘Star Wars’ (1977), and this film must have been a HUGE influence on George Lucas and John Williams. And notice the artful way all the excitement is handled, the directors balancing beauty and action perfectly such as during Robin and Guy’s climatic duel and they start fighting off camera so we can watch their shadows battling against the wall. Combine that with some phenomenal editing, skilful sword-fighting and Erich Korngold providing one of the greatest scores in cinema history (I could write an entire piece about the soundtrack alone) and ‘The Adventures of Robin Hood’ starts demanding superlatives.
It’s only February but already I feel I’ve just watched what is easily going to be one of my favourite movies of 2020. Even after the second time I watched it I was left sitting with a massive grin on my face and a deep sense of satisfying guilt; guilt because I’m not too sure we deserve movies this good anymore.
