Sun 8 May 2022
A Movie Review by Dan Stumpf: THE ROVER (1967).
Posted by Steve under Action Adventure movies , Reviews[5] Comments
THE ROVER. United Artists, 1967. Released first in Italy as L’avventuriero. Anthony Quinn, Rosanna Schiaffino, Rita Hayworth, Richard Johnson, Ivo Garrani, Luciano Rossi, Anthony Dawson. Based on the novel by Joseph Conrad. Director: Terence Young.
It was with some bemusement I watched The Rover, a film based on Joseph Conrad’s novel, a cheap-jack multinational production/tax write-off which captures nothing at all of Conrad’s ethos and even less of the brooding excitement of his writing at its best.
What we’re left with is Anthony Quinn — that charismatic actor whose career had more bad steps than a derelict lighthouse — as a Napoleonic-era trench privateer returned to his country with all too little to show his head-hunting bosses. He falls in love with a mysterious young woman, tries to refit a derelict ship and slip past a British blockade, but by that time, everyone’s pretty much lost interest in this shabby show.
How tacky is it? Well, aside from the perfunctory photography and poor dubbing, it’s set in a rather sparsely-populated France (well, maybe everyone was off fighting the wars) with few buildings, one or two streets, and maybe four horses. And the scene of a British ship chasing the privateer was very obviously filmed with One ship photographed from different angles, edited to try and make it look like Two — which don’t work.
Sad to see talents that once showed some promise stuck in this movie-mire: The Rover was directed by Terence Young, who made movie history a few years earlier launching the James Bond series; aside from Quinn, it features Rita Hayworth and Richard Johnson (who at various times embodied Bulldog Drummond and Lord Nelson) and, in a teeny-tiny part, tucked off in a corner somewhere, movie-goers with long memories will spot Anthony Dawson and wonder what became of the promising actor so memorable as the unlucky Cpt. Lesgate in Hitchcock’s Dial M for Murder.
May 8th, 2022 at 9:35 pm
It’s one of Conrad’s more accessible stories in cinematic terms, meaning you could do a faithful film version that was pretty good without having to stray too far from the book.
Alas it is pretentious when it should be fun, slow when it should move quickly, and filled with grunting brooding actors all better than the material save for Quinn who is doing Zorba the French pirate in his worst late style.
Obviously, no one believed in this project, and no one seems to have wanted to do it, then because it was Conrad they got all self important and forgot it was first an adventure story and then Joseph Conrad.
The fact they seem to have misspelled Rita Hayworth’s name in the poster says a lot about this one.
May 8th, 2022 at 10:19 pm
I’ve not seen this movie, but your description of Anthony Quinn as “Zorba the French pirate” is not very persuasive.
Nor by Dan’s overall review, for that matter.
As for the poster, I didn’t catch that. I assumed it was designed for Spanish audiences, so maybe the Italian staff and crew can’t be blamed for that.
May 8th, 2022 at 11:29 pm
Quinn by this point in his career was mostly coasting on his considerable and hard earned reputation. No blame for that, he had been in films since the pre code era, but here he is playing Quinn playing a role rather than a character.
This one really can’t decide if it is as Dan says a tax write off, an art film, or a toss off. There was potential for a decent adventure film even a Conradian one, but the script is indifferent and no one seems particularly interested in making it better.
It could have survived the low budget, but not the disinterest.
May 9th, 2022 at 8:30 am
A couple of years earlier Quinn was in another cursed film abandoned by its producers, A High Wind in Jamaica, but Alexander Mackendrick managed to get Quinn and Coburn to turn in good performances there.
May 9th, 2022 at 8:36 am
Chandler worthy metaphor: “that charismatic actor whose career had more bad steps than a derelict lighthouse.”