Review: "Arabian Nights" (1942) And "Al Baba And The Forty Thieves" (1944); Blu-ray Special Editions
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“Technicolor Sabers”
By Raymond Benson
Was this really a movie sub-genre? Colorful “Middle Eastern” action-comedy-adventures loosely derived from The Book of One Thousand and One Nights? Full of harem girls, saber-wielding swashbucklers, epic set pieces with beautifully designed sets and “Arabian” costumes, camels and horses and tigers, and… comedians?
The answer is, ahem, yes. During the war years of the early 1940s, Universal Pictures made several of these “exotic adventure” pictures that capitalized on the success of Britain’s Thief of Bagdad (1940). Hollywood quickly got into this act, but like the Bing Crosby and Bob Hope “Road to…” pictures, these movies set in the world of ancient Arabia were filmed on sound stages in southern California… and it shows.
The films were hugely popular at the time, but they have not aged well. We shall examine two of the more successful entries of...
“Technicolor Sabers”
By Raymond Benson
Was this really a movie sub-genre? Colorful “Middle Eastern” action-comedy-adventures loosely derived from The Book of One Thousand and One Nights? Full of harem girls, saber-wielding swashbucklers, epic set pieces with beautifully designed sets and “Arabian” costumes, camels and horses and tigers, and… comedians?
The answer is, ahem, yes. During the war years of the early 1940s, Universal Pictures made several of these “exotic adventure” pictures that capitalized on the success of Britain’s Thief of Bagdad (1940). Hollywood quickly got into this act, but like the Bing Crosby and Bob Hope “Road to…” pictures, these movies set in the world of ancient Arabia were filmed on sound stages in southern California… and it shows.
The films were hugely popular at the time, but they have not aged well. We shall examine two of the more successful entries of...
- 8/4/2020
- by nospam@example.com (Cinema Retro)
- Cinemaretro.com
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