Product Description

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. Studio: Kino International Release Date: 02/03/2004 Starring: Douglas Fairbanks Enid Bennett Run time: 133 minutes Rating: Nr Director: Allan Dwan

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #90693 in DVD
• Released on: 2004-02-03
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: DVD, Silent, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 127 minutes

Amazon.com essential video
Robin Hood was a dream project for dashing Douglas Fairbanks and he brought the full resources of his studio to the film, building the largest standing set ever for Prince John's magnificent castle and filling open plains with thousands of extras. The sense of scale still awes audiences, yet none of it detracts from the vigorous presence of Fairbanks, a hearty hero with grace, gymnastic prowess, and a sense of humor as big as Sherwood Forest. It takes some time for this first incarnation of the great bandit hero to get started--the first hour is a little slow as it establishes the conflict between Prince John and the Earl of Huntington (Fairbanks) in moody scenes inside the dark, torch-lit castle. But when the disenfranchised Earl transforms into forest warrior Robin Hood with a gazelle-like entrance, the film becomes a sweeping adventure classic full of swordfights, jousts, larger-than-life stunts, and Fairbanks's brand of jaunty heroism. Allan Dwan balances the enormous sense of scale with scenes of intimacy and quiet, all realized in a rich black-and-white palette of contrasts both bold and delicate. Wallace Beery costars as Richard the Lionhearted with Fairbanks favorite Sam De Grasse as the villainous Prince John and Alan Hale as Robin's faithful squire turned comrade in arms Little John, a role he also played in the famous Errol Flynn remake of 1938. Fairbanks fans each have their favorites, but all agree than none is as magnificent as Robin Hood. --Sean Axmaker

Customer Reviews

A Blockbuster of its day...
Ah, a budget of $1 million. It sounds so small today when there are films with budgets topping $200 million. But back in 1922, this was the most expensive movie made. And it's clear where the money has gone. Lush sets, huge castles created just for this movie (with special tapestries, hand and foot holds, etc. to allow Fairbanks to show off his stuntman's prowess.) And then the extras. In one of the earliest ballads, Robin Hood had a band of 140 men. Here, there are far, far more. And no digitally extras either. Just low-paid (or more likely, no-paid) folks prancing around.

Yes, prancing. Sigh.

The Merry Men skip and jump, with little edge that outlaws would have. Not so with Fairbanks successor Errol Flynn, as charismatic and righteous as that Robin Hood was, there was a real sense of anger at the problems being inflicted on the poor. This earlier (although not the first) Robin Hood movie is much lighter fare.

The story is only threadbare. And only a few scenes from the ballads appear. Instead, half the film is taken up with jousting matches and other things which seem out of place in a Robin Hood film. Like modern-day blockbusters, it's big on spectacle and low on plot and character.

It's a classic, but it doesn't grab me the way Flynn's Robin Hood does. It lacks the heart and soul.

Now, onto the DVD quality. The image is surprisingly good for an 80-year old film. And they've gone with the colour-tinting process. Forest scenes, for example, are tinted green. That adds a warmth to the film lacking in its characters.

Unfortunately, the sound isn't as good. The score is electronic and very noticeably so. And it sounds more like an electronic kazoo than a real piano or organ as it should be. That is very distracting. Which is unfortunate, because the score itself is adapted from the 1890s Robin Hood stage musical composed by Reginald de Koven (this production introduced the wedding song "O Promise Me"). It would have been nice to hear a less synthetic version of de Koven's score.

So, riddle me this -- why is this film on DVD and not the 1938 Adventures of Robin Hood starring Errol Flynn? (And while its nice to see Fairbanks turn as Robin Hood and Zorro on DVD, I'd really like to own the Flynn and Tyrone Powers versions of those films.)

How to crumble a classic....
"Douglas Fairbanks' Robin Hood" is one of the greatest adventure films the cinema has ever produced.
It no longer exists in a pristine version, so I'm afraid this is the best way to watch it, and although any company that produces DVDs of silent films should be applauded this disc should be approached with some caution.
The reason is the score. I hate synth scores on silent films. Firstly it is totally out of place to stick an electronic soundtrack on an old film - but here it really is unacceptable. The recording of the score is so irritating and twee it cheapens the film. Robin Hood screams out for a full orchestral score, not a tinny electronic beat that sounds like a cheap Casio keyboard.
Fair enough, points can be made for cost etc. but the simple fact remains - would you pay good money to see Gone With the Wind or Titanic with a cheesy synth score? Although the film itself would remain the same, so much of the power and passion would be destroyed when the score is replaced. Would Jaws or even Psycho have anything near the same effect if you stuck the Backstreet Boys over the shower scene?
The same goes for silent films, perhaps more so. To watch the Brownlow and Gill restoration of Fairbanks' Thief of Bagdad is to watch a beautiful classic of the silent screen with a perfect score conducted by Carl Davis. To watch the same film with a syth or organ score is to see half the film. It looks exactly the same - but loses so much sweep and power.
Get the DVD, switch the sound off and stick on a suitable CD. The film is improved hugely. (By the way, using public domain classical recordings is the easiest and cheapest way to get a decent score - if any DVD producers are reading this...)

A wonderful costume drama
Though perhaps not as consistently action-filled and developed plotwise as other of Fairbanks's films, I really enjoyed this one. I was prepared for it to be a typical silent costume drama as it began, but though it does have a number of the same potential drawbacks (particularly for someone new to the silent cinema), such as an awful lot of intertitles, a plot that could use more definition and shape, a lot of different characters to keep track of, and a longer running time than most silents, it's a lot more interesting and faster-paced than most seem to be. And some people aren't going to like costume dramas anyway because not everyone likes history, or at least the historical era in that particular film. Medieval history was never one of my own fields of interest until just recently; in the past several years I've come to love that era more and more, so the historical setting held an added interest for me. (Usually these costume dramas seem to be set in 17th or 18th century France.) The first half of the film does move a bit slowly at times, which certainly could bore some people, but that serves to set up the situation and characters. This cinematic device can work very well at really drawing the viewer into the story and keeping his or her interest in the slowly but surely unfolding plot. The second half is much more action-packed, the kind of thing Doug was famous for, even though it's not the movie to watch if you're interested in seeing him take center-stage for most of the action. With so many other characters here, he's not always going to be the center of the action or even onscreen at all.

Although the jury is still out on just who the real Robin Hood was and when exactly he lived (he appeared on the scene anywhere between 1190 and the 1320s), this version of the famous story is the one that most people are the most familiar with. Robert, Earl of Huntingdon, is in a jousting match witnessed by his good buddy, King Richard I (the Lionhearted), and his jerk of a brother Prince John (later King John I). Prince John's henchman, Sir Guy of Gisbourne, has buckled himself into his saddle to ensure himself of a win, but to his surprise is easily beaten anyway by Huntingdon. It then comes out that Huntingdon is afraid of women, so much so he has trouble getting one to put the wreath of laurels on his head. This fear of women, however, is soon cured when he catches Prince John trying to abduct Lady Marian, whom he, of course, falls head over heels in love with at first sight. King Richard is pleased as punch that his friend finally has a woman to fight for, particularly since they're about to leave on the Third Crusade. (Richard was not so successful on this Crusade as he's made out to be in the movie, particularly not after his truce with Sultan Saladin; he was shipwrecked on the way home and wound up in Austria, where he was caught by his enemy Duke Leopold V and held for ransom before being taken back to England.) Before they can even get to the fighting, however, Huntingdon receives a message from Marian, saying that John has taken control and is doing horrible things (which did happen in real life; it's said that England has never had another king named John since because this man was such a horrible evil king). Huntingdon does not get permission from Richard to return to England (he felt that if he knew the real reason he wanted to leave, he would be distracted from doing well on the battlefield), and ends up framed for desertion and thrown into prison. He later manages to escape, and returns to England as Robin Hood, who robs from the rich and gives to the poor, and who fights against Prince John's evil henchmen. He and his followers are committed to fighting the good fight till Richard comes home and can rule again. Though not as action-packed or edge of one's seat exciting as some of Doug's other films, it's still a very solid and entertaining story.

Extras are outtakes and an excerpt from the 1923 Will Rogers short 'Big Moments from Little Pictures.' The print used for this edition is in wonderful shape (as is to be expected from a Kino release), and the soundtrack used is also very well-chosen, particularly since it's the soundtrack that was originally written for this film in 1922. I didn't find anything inappropriate or annoying about how some of it was performed with a synthesiser. If one's complaints about a DVD release of a classic are as petty as that, then it seems safe to say there's nothing really wrong with it, or at least nothing that the average (non-purist) silent film fan will have any issues with.