The Sea Hawk was the eleventh of twelve collaborations between actor Errol Flynn and director Michael Curtiz, and one of the best. It's a return to the sure-fire swashbuckler format that had given them their biggest successes so far, but it has a maturity and a darkness to it that was absent from their previous efforts.
Comparing this to Flynn's previous sea-faring adventure Captain Blood, made in 1935, you can see how much cinema had changed in the intervening years. Despite the title, the earlier film isn't really that bloodthirsty. Its depiction of slavery is fairly tame, there aren't too many deaths, and the tone remains optimistic throughout. The Sea Hawk on the other hand, while still a rousing swashbuckler is shot through with despair. The galley-slave scenes come far closer to reality than Captain Blood's plantation. Darker still are the sepia-tinted Panama scenes, where some men are gunned down in cold blood, only for others to die by inches under a glaring sun. Above all, you really get the impression that this time, the enemy is truly menacing, and it will take the heroes more than a few cutting remarks and a few minutes of derring-do to get out alive. The approach of World War Two (which broke out during production) in particular seems to have cast a shadow over this picture.
The Sea Hawk is not an out-and-out propaganda piece, but demonstrates that fear of a sinister, aggressive nation bent on world domination, which had been subtly creeping into cinema during the late 1930s (a good example is Hitchcock's The Lady Vanishes). I don't know for certain but I get the feeling that Elizabeth's final speech at the end of the picture may have been added at the last minute when war began. However, even without this rather obvious morale booster on the final reel, the comparison between 16th century Spain and Hitler's Germany is fairly clear. Right from the opening scene, the Spaniards are introduced as particularly sinister types (the sinister touch, by the way, is something Curtiz was really good at; there's a hint of it in nearly all his films). On top of that there's this dark feeling that here is a real enemy, not some cartoon villain we can laugh away.
Regardless of the context, The Sea Hawk also stands out amongst Flynn's swashbucklers because of the strength of its elements. The score by Erich Wolfgang Korngold is one of his best. The production design is particularly lavish, and the hefty budget enabled Curtiz to get a really grand scale to the sea battles. The cast is fantastic too. Flynn was really maturing as an actor, and he gives a kind of sober world-weariness to the character. Some of the era's best supporting players make appearances, including Alan Hale, Claude Rains and Una O'Connor. There's also a memorable turn by Victor Varconi albeit just a couple of lines as a sleazy Spanish general. There are a few wrong notes for example Brenda Marshall's character is equally as annoying as the usual Oliva de Havilland heroine, although she isn't as good an actor. Henry Daniel also isn't a match for Basil Rathbone.
So, a more mature Errol Flynn, a darker edge to the adventure picture, but also the end of an era. Flynn and Curtiz were soon to part ways, and the adventure genre as a whole was beginning to wane in favour of the western and the noir thriller.
Comparing this to Flynn's previous sea-faring adventure Captain Blood, made in 1935, you can see how much cinema had changed in the intervening years. Despite the title, the earlier film isn't really that bloodthirsty. Its depiction of slavery is fairly tame, there aren't too many deaths, and the tone remains optimistic throughout. The Sea Hawk on the other hand, while still a rousing swashbuckler is shot through with despair. The galley-slave scenes come far closer to reality than Captain Blood's plantation. Darker still are the sepia-tinted Panama scenes, where some men are gunned down in cold blood, only for others to die by inches under a glaring sun. Above all, you really get the impression that this time, the enemy is truly menacing, and it will take the heroes more than a few cutting remarks and a few minutes of derring-do to get out alive. The approach of World War Two (which broke out during production) in particular seems to have cast a shadow over this picture.
The Sea Hawk is not an out-and-out propaganda piece, but demonstrates that fear of a sinister, aggressive nation bent on world domination, which had been subtly creeping into cinema during the late 1930s (a good example is Hitchcock's The Lady Vanishes). I don't know for certain but I get the feeling that Elizabeth's final speech at the end of the picture may have been added at the last minute when war began. However, even without this rather obvious morale booster on the final reel, the comparison between 16th century Spain and Hitler's Germany is fairly clear. Right from the opening scene, the Spaniards are introduced as particularly sinister types (the sinister touch, by the way, is something Curtiz was really good at; there's a hint of it in nearly all his films). On top of that there's this dark feeling that here is a real enemy, not some cartoon villain we can laugh away.
Regardless of the context, The Sea Hawk also stands out amongst Flynn's swashbucklers because of the strength of its elements. The score by Erich Wolfgang Korngold is one of his best. The production design is particularly lavish, and the hefty budget enabled Curtiz to get a really grand scale to the sea battles. The cast is fantastic too. Flynn was really maturing as an actor, and he gives a kind of sober world-weariness to the character. Some of the era's best supporting players make appearances, including Alan Hale, Claude Rains and Una O'Connor. There's also a memorable turn by Victor Varconi albeit just a couple of lines as a sleazy Spanish general. There are a few wrong notes for example Brenda Marshall's character is equally as annoying as the usual Oliva de Havilland heroine, although she isn't as good an actor. Henry Daniel also isn't a match for Basil Rathbone.
So, a more mature Errol Flynn, a darker edge to the adventure picture, but also the end of an era. Flynn and Curtiz were soon to part ways, and the adventure genre as a whole was beginning to wane in favour of the western and the noir thriller.