Search - Douglas Fairbanks 3 Disc Collector's Edition on DVD

8 film set offers great selection of Fairbanks swashbucklers

Susan Z. Swan | Dubai, UAE | 02/08/2009

(3 out of 5 stars)

"This 3 Disc set includes 8 movies: Disc 1: Thief of Baghdad & Robin Hood; Disc 2: Mark of Zorro, The Iron Mask, Don Q-Son of Zorro; Disc 3: The Black Pirate, The Americano, and the Three Musketeers. It is designed for all regions (not just region 1). All are silent and in black & white --the color gels from the originals, such as the sepia and blue in the Black Pirate are missing. The bonus features are still picture gallerys (movie posters and advertisements) and one radio broadcast of Zorro. The remasterings are pretty good, although it is important to keep in mind that these are all from the 1920s. -- Douglas Fairbanks set the mark for athleticism in adventure movies, establishing a high energy tone, humour, and penchant for doing his own stunts that guided the first talkie adventure films of the 1930s/1940s and created the context for adventure today from Indiana Jones to James Bond. The original films would have been shown with an organist or pianist providing the music in each theatre; the creators of this set do a fair to middling job of selecting appropriate mood music to go with the films. The Iron Mask and Mark of Zorro are right on; I finally muted it on Three Musketeers to keep the film from being ruined. The Robin Hood music is livable, but certainly not the glory that is Korngold's soundtrack for the Errol Flynn Robin Hood."