20th's Christmas Gift To 1947 Crowds

Captain From Castile (1947) Is Noir With A Sword

Merry Christmas, Cleveland

Fox and I-Tunes earn plaudits for delivering this costs-be-damned blockbuster to High-Def watchers at long last. Castile needs all of aural/visual help it can get, locations (spectacular) and Alfred Newman scoring being best elements. Otherwise, certainly story-wise, it is episodic, sometimes clunky, at two hours and twenty minutes the epic takes to unfold. I haven't read Samuel Shellabarger's source novel, but judging by result here, it may be much the same (can anyone confirm or deny?). I call Castile and two-years-later Prince Of Foxes "noir with swords" for hanging costumes on grim subject matter where double-dealing is rife and no one's to be trusted. Lacking is cheer of Zorro or The Black Swan. Did all genres come out of WWII under such cloud? Less swash than vinegar, Castile makes us pay dear for color, music and spectacle it's best known for.

Tyrone Power's title character is three times arrested and bound up in chains. His twelve-year-old sister is tortured to death by the Inquisition. Second half sees Ty head-shot with an arrow --- painful on-screen surgery follows. Captain From Castile fairly hangs with crepe, and we wonder if this was war-born attitude on part of writer-producing Lamar Trotti, director Henry King, or both. Buffs recall Nightmare Alley as Fox and Power's big depart from dream merchandising, but Captain From Castile is the real downer. Still ... I watch and watch again. There was delay seeing Castile a first time, a single 70's run on Charlotte Channel 9 before the SFM Holiday Network ran it w/considerable trims in the early 80's. 16mm Technicolor prints (so few extant) were Rembrandt equivalent for collectors at the time. On High-Def streaming, Castile looks good as I suppose technology can allow, the prior DVD well in shade beside it.

Fox tied holiday hopes on Captain From Castile for 1947, the tab at finish $4.5 million, spending bested only by Forever Amber (6.3!). There was just no way to get that back, and so Castile, despite being a hit ($5.9 million worldwide), lost over a million. Fox would cinch belts after free-spend year that was '47. We can really see economies imposed with product from 1948, the new order lasting to intro of Cinemascope and hypo, if temporary, supplied by that wide process. Costs ran amok most when on location, Captain From Castile gone south of border to face delay and weather-imposed snafus. Mexican backdrop is a lift, King and crew shooting against clouds as well as expected blue sky. The effect rates high on 40's color charts and presages some of departure John Ford would take from Tech orthodoxy for She Wore A Yellow Ribbon two years later. We expect volcanoes on view to be matte-painted, but they're real, and erupting in the bargain. Henry King had habit of flying his private plane over sites under consideration; he'd see and remember best of landscape from hundreds of square miles observed (King knew Mexico from air vantage long before Captain From Castile). "Filmed Where It Happened" brag was honestly applied here, Mexico location standing in for action set there, plus Spain background of a first half.

Captain From Castile is history, if harsh. The Cortez expedition, joined by Ty Power's title character, was bold grab for loot, and the film makes no amend for ruthless ways gold was got. Castile reflects postwar reality of wised-up patronage and everyone out to serve himself. Clear-drawn black-and-white of hero v. villain goes past shades of gray to rendering a whole cast dark, reason Castile disturbed me at young age where I preferred Zorro world of right being might with evil vanquished. So don't come to Castile for heroes in clean skirts. Power as much as anyone serves selfish end and continues so to the fade. Wounds of foresaid arrow plus Act Three stabbing don't materially change his attitude (Ty laughs when Aztec temples are leveled by raiding Cortez). First apostle of me-first is Caesar Romero in latter role, him stealing Castile second half as ultra-motivated New World despoiler. Today's rigid Code would make Cortez a heavy on no uncertain terms, but in 1947? --- you go, Hernando.

In-house star creation was still achievable, if tougher, after the war. 20th needed names to replace a senior class eased out with transition to the 50's. Tyrone Power felt ground shift as vehicles took modest turn after Castile loss. It would be Gregory Peck henceforth for first chair at Zanuck table (a not dissimilar passing of torch went on at Warners as Burt Lancaster took projects once defaulted to Errol Flynn, and Peck was there too to have intended-for-Flynn Captain Horatio Hornblower). The Fox broom swept women as peremptorily, "new faces" brought on sure as a high school's prom queen was dethroned by next year's pick. Jean Peters had not an ounce of experience, film or stage, but Henry King gave three days to testing her and clinched female lead for the newcomer with his endorsement to DFZ. Such was Zanuck's trust in King that he stamped Peters a go, major career a clinch with Power away. Thus could stars be born with a single and highest-profile production such as Captain From Castile.