The Four Feathers (1939)

The titular four feathers symbolize cowardous...; what? Okay, now that's just plain bogus, and no, not because we're talking odd symbolism, but because they're going to need a lot more feathers if they're going to make a symbolic chicken. Yeah, I know that sounded cheesy, but hey, it's no worse of a joke than the 2002 version of this film, or at least that's what a couple of critics would say. I, for one, really dug the '02 version, and if I was saying that just because I miss Heath Ledger, then I probably wouldn't find "The Dark Knight" overrated. I dug 2002's "The Four Feathers", but thought "The Dark Knight" was just alright; that should tell you about my credibility. Well, I certainly know enough to tell you a good classic when I see one, and believe me, this is one of them. However, I'm no four feathers-carrying coward; I'm not afraid to tell you that, while I do like the film, it's not without many a misstep.

Being a grand piece of source material's epic film adaptation that runs under two hours, tightness to a fault is to be expected, and here, you, well, don't really get that. I was surprised at how comfortable the brief script is, but when it came to the execution of the script, things did stand to be broader. The film jars here and there during some pretty major shifts in character and story, though what keep the film from hitting the most is the shortage of oomph. Now, I understand that it's 1939 and that the quality of an epic by that time was nothing too special, but this was still the year of "Gone with the Wind", and even that followed some pretty effective epics. I'm not saying slap an extra 100 minutes on this bad boy and make it an unrelenting barrage of sweep, nor am I really trying to judge this film on the basis of comparison, but what I'm getting at is that this film doesn't always deliver on the oomph to match its sweep, creating a contradiction that will leave some to momentarily disengage. However, for every lull in the film, there's way more than enough cold strikes to pull you back in. It's certainly no "Gone With the Wind", but this film still stands as a pretty sharp testament to classic epic sweep, brief though, the final product may be.

This is one of the first big production films to leave black-and-white, and boy does it leave it gracefully, with color, lighting and sweep that does something that, back then, stood as a truly strong mark of a clever cinematographer. Georges Perinal's manipulation of limitation is not as brilliantly groundbreaking as Gregg Toland's was in "Citizen Kane", but this film summons a form of charm in its simplicity, while still providing a lot of dazzle and sweep, which of course compliments the pretty excellent action. Again, director Zoltan Korda doesn't always deliver on the oomph and tension that could have made the action all the heavier, but the man certainly knew sweep and staging when it came to this film's big battle sequences, which are engaging, lively and fairly effective. There is a degree of adventurous feel in the film, and while Zoltan doesn't deliver on the atmosphere as thoroughly as he should, his performers do... though still not as thoroughly as they should. There's shame, violence, death, entrapment and even blindness that fall upon these poor suckers, and the writers, like most of that era, play up those aspects with an almost embarassing touch of 1930s safety. Say what you will about the 2002 version, it was at least still more hardcore than this film, and not to mention the fact that it starred Wes Bentley and ...sniffle... Heath Ledger, so of course the acting isn't as good as it should be, because it's just so underwritten. However, what the performers are asked to do, from being charismatic to playing up some actual material, they do it with charm and some pretty sharp skill for the time, leaving you compelled by them just as much as you're compelled by the sweeping technical value.

Overall, the script is riddled with sweep, even with its unfortunately brief runtime, yet director Zoltan Korda doesn't always deliver on the intrigue nor an organic flow in the storytelling, leaving several moments to become disengaging, but you'd be hard pressed to not quickly be woken back up by the sweeping, dazzling technical value and generally winning performances that ultimately prevail over the missteps and leave Korda's classic take on "The Four Feathers" an entertaining and generally compelling relatively brief epic.

3/5 - Good