THE PIRATES OF BLOOD RIVER (1961) *1/2 Hammer Studios goes pirate, but it feels more like a western. In the opening scene a heaving adultress is pursued by puritans through the underbrush until she jumps in the lake, at which point she is consumed by piranhas. It's not that they're misogynists, more that they're highly selective observers of history. Features one of the more visually impressive cadres of pirates put down to celluloid (Michael Ripper, Peter Arne). Christopher Lee cuts quite the figure as leader eyepatch, all dressed in black, save for a blue scarf on his head and a silver belt of power. Unfortunately he also distracts from himself in enormous measure-is he a Romanian pirate? What could that accent possibly be? Does this sort of thing plague other actors who appear in too many vampire flicks? Are there any? My favourite scene finds Oliver Reed, typecast as a lusty drunken pirate (was he truely so bountiful that he could be typecast as anything? I mean, he was really even some form of purist puritan, wasn't he?), drunkenly trying to slog through the swamp. I'm not sure if the script called for him to be drunk, but of course he most certainly was. A fight ensues, again, one that I suspect was unscripted. A man can only deal with the muck for so long without lashing out. Speaking of which...am I the only commentator to ever ponder the sensibilities of Kerwin Mathews, battling so feverishly for his right to be returned to the penal colony? Impressively, for Hammer, not entirely bereft of social commentary--on the other-worldly capabilities of fundamentalists to oppress sensible people, on the darkness that clouds mens' souls, and on the ability of bonding in groups to bring it out. Why is it, for example, that the more fundamentalist a religious organization is, the more import they ascribe to amassing a destructive arsenal? Moral of the story-don't ever throw a pirate in a vat of wine. In anger, I mean, obviously.
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