Prince Valiant **** (1954, Robert Wagner, James Mason, Janet Leigh, Debra Paget) – Classic Movie Review 1301

Three cheers for director Henry Hathaway’s vividly realized, brilliantly colourful 1954 sword-fighting historical adventure extravaganza. It stars a marvellous, on-form cast in Robert Wagner as a fresh-faced Viking Prince Valiant, James Mason as the villainous Sir Brack, Janet Leigh as the wholesome Welsh Princess Aleta and Debra Paget as her sister, the sultry Lady Ilene among the folk fighting the battles and enjoying romance in the England of King Arthur (Brian Aherne).

King Aguar (Donald Crisp) of the Viking kingdom of Scandia sends his oddly-haircutted young, inexperienced son Prince Valiant (Robert Wagner) to Camelot to undergo training as a knight under the tutelage of Aguar’s family friend, the noble knight of the Round Table, Sir Gawain (Sterling Hayden).

Later, back home in Scandia, Valiant stirs up a revolution to restore his now deposed and exiled father to his kingship, then returns to Britain, where he falls for the coolly lovely Leigh’s princess Aleta, uncovers a plot against King Arthur and clashes to the death with Mason’s wicked black knight Sir Brack.

The 6’ 6” heavyweight boxing champion Primo Carnera plays the usurper Viking warlord Sligon, a worshipper of the old Norse god pantheon, who leads the Viking rebels against King Aguar. Victor McLaglen co-stars as Boltar and Barry Jones plays King Luke, the father of Aleta and Ilene.

From the attractive, exciting cast and Dudley Nichols’s vivacious, beautifully plotted screenplay (based on the long-running King Features Syndicate cartoon strip by Hal Foster), to producer Robert L Jacks’s sumptuous 20th Century Fox production, with its impeccable Technicolor CinemaScope cinematography from Lucien Ballard, rousing score by Franz Waxman, eye-catching sets by Lyle Wheeler and Mark-Lee Kirk and gorgeous costumes, it’s a valiant achievement that provides 100 minutes of perfect pleasure. Wagner and Mason are perfect yin and yang as embodiments of good and evil.

Mary Philips, Howard Wendell, Tom Conway, Sammy Ogg, Neville Brand, Basil Ruysdael, Don Megowan, Richard Webb, John Dierkes, Carleton Young, Hal Baylor, Mickey Simpson, Gene Roth and Otto Waldis co-star.

There was filming in England at Alnwick Castle, Northumberland, and Warwick Castle and in Scotland at Duart Castle, Mull, Argyll and Bute, and Eilean Donan Castle, Dornie, Highland. But of course most of it was shot on the 20th Century Fox Studios backlot in LA.

There is also a 1997 version of Prince Valiant, an Irish-British independent film directed by Anthony Hickox and starring Stephen Moyer (in his debut), Katherine Heigl, Thomas Kretschmann, Edward Fox, Udo Kier and Ron Perlman, with Joanna Lumley as  evil sorceress Morgan le Fay and the director as Prince Gawain. Valiant starts by masquerading as English knight Sir Gawain but ends up as a prince when it turns out he is the rightful heir to the throne of Thule.

One of the actors involved, Warwick Davis, described it as ‘a disaster from start to finish’ that was ‘premiered, panned and bombed’. Moyer is best known as vampire Bill Compton in the HBO series True Blood since 2008. He married his co-star Anna Paquin on 21 August 2010.

But if ever a film deserved a remake now, it’s Prince Valiant.

Wagner with his wife Natalie Wood in 1960.

Wagner is known for his role as Number Two in the Austin Powers trilogy of films (1997, 1999, 2002), as well as for A Kiss Before Dying, The Pink Panther, Harper and The Towering Inferno.

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(C) Derek Winnert 2014 Classic Movie Review 1301

Link to Derek Winnert’s home page for more film reviews: http://derekwinnert.com/

Leigh on the cover of the February 1951 issue of Eiga No Tomo.

Leigh with husband Tony Curtis in 1953.