Year:
1997
Studio:
United Productions
Feature:
4/5
DVD:
3/5
Horatio Hornblower: The
Complete Adventures is a boxed set consisting of six DVDs with
one movie per dvd. Years ago Meridian Broadcasting and the A&E
Network funded a series of four movies, later expanded by another two
movies when the four movies were successful.
The them is the late 18th century seafaring adventures of Midshipman
(and later Lieutenant) Horatio Hornblower, CS Forester's famous
nautical character. The movies are based on various of the Forester
books since he did write several "Young Horatio" books.
Now, I'm not too sure how accurate the movies are since I haven't read
the books. But I have listened to the Horatio Hornblower radio show and
I did recognize all the various stories, though of course details are
changed as future generations interpret the themes a bit differently.
Ioan Gruffud plays the title role of Horatio. Back then he was an
unknown Welsh actor and now he's currently on The Fantastic Four which came out
last week. He plays the role quite well, having a charming stiff
British upper lip character.
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Robert Lindsay
plays Captain Pellew, his commanding officer in the
first four adventures and making a guest appearance in the next two
adventures. Jamie Bamber plays Horatio's friend, Ensign Kennedy. Paul
Copley and Sean Gilder play two of his loyal deckhands, Matthews and
Styles.
The movies are quite good. For television the action and effects are
better than average. They built two almost-real-sized sailing ships and
they had several large models for the sea battles. Period uniform
abounds. It does have a definite television look to it but the stories
are entertaining.
There are a few scattered about, mostly short text bits but there are
three programs: "The Making of Horatio Hornblower", "England's Royal
Warships" and "Sail 2000: Aboard the Eagle". The programs are 25 to 45
minutes long and they were broadcast by A&E as part of the Horatio
Hornblower mania.
Overall it's a nice DVD set. The DVD menus and navigation are good. The
picture quality is great. The extras, even being basically throw-ins,
add to the flavor. Well worth buying.
As a final note, the title is now somewhat of a misnomer. Apparently
there were two more Young Horatio movies made in 2003 (after this DVD
set was released) but I don't recall seeing them on television. Then
again that was about the time when I didn't have cable television.
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