The Golden Hawk | |
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Directed by | Sidney Salkow |
Written by | Frank Yerby Robert E. Kent |
Based on | The Golden Hawk by Frank Yerby |
Produced by | Sam Katzman |
Starring | Rhonda Fleming Sterling Hayden John Sutton |
Cinematography | William V. Skall |
Edited by | Edwin Bryant |
Music by | Mischa Bakaleinikoff |
Production company | Esskay Pictures |
Distributed by | Columbia Pictures |
Release date |
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Running time | 83 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
The Golden Hawk is a 1952 American historical adventure film directed by Sidney Salkow and starring Rhonda Fleming, Sterling Hayden and John Sutton. [1] It is based on the 1948 novel of the same name by Frank Yerby. [2] [3]
French sea captain Kit 'The Hawk' Gerardo sails the seas in the 17th century in command of the ship Sea Flower, seeking out Spanish pirate Luis del Toro, believing him responsible for the death of Kit's mother Jeanne Buoyant.
A female pirate who calls herself Captain Rouge disguises herself as a Dutch maid to board a vessel, then shoots and wounds Kit when he attempts to make romantic advances. Kit kidnaps a woman, Bianca, the betrothed of del Toro, and demands 10,000 pieces of gold for her safe return. Del Toro pays, then surrounds Kit with three of his ships to take it back. Rouge wants half the loot for herself. In a raid of Jamaica on orders of the king, Kit discovers that the property once belonged to Rouge, who is a British subject, Lady Jane Golfin, trying to retrieve the riches that have been illegally taken from her family.
Bianca, in love with Kit, betrays him and Kit ends up tried, convicted and sentenced to hang. Del Toro intervenes on his behalf, however, and reveals that Kit is his own son.
Frank Yerby's novel was published in 1948. [4] The book was a best seller, selling 1,863,000 copies. [5] In 1951 it was announced Sterling Hayden and Rhonda Fleming would star in a film version. [6] Helena Carter played the second female lead. [7]
Geoffrey Roy Rush is an Australian actor. Known for often playing eccentric roles on both stage and screen, he has received numerous accolades, including an Academy Award, a Primetime Emmy Award and a Tony Award, making him the only Australian to achieve the Triple Crown of Acting, in addition to three BAFTA Awards and two Golden Globe Awards. Rush is the founding president of the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts and was named the 2012 Australian of the Year.
Sword-and-sandal, also known as peplum, is a subgenre of largely Italian-made historical, mythological, or biblical epics mostly set in the Greco-Roman antiquity or the Middle Ages. These films attempted to emulate the big-budget Hollywood historical epics of the time, such as Samson and Delilah (1949), Quo Vadis (1951), The Robe (1953), The Ten Commandments (1956), Ben-Hur (1959), Spartacus (1960), and Cleopatra (1963). These films dominated the Italian film industry from 1958 to 1965, eventually being replaced in 1965 by spaghetti Western and Eurospy films.
Mary Read, was an English pirate about whom there is very little factual documentation. She and Anne Bonny were among the few female pirates during the "Golden Age of Piracy".
Frank Garvin Yerby was an American writer, best known for his 1946 historical novel The Foxes of Harrow.
Sterling Walter Hayden was an American actor, author, sailor, model and Marine. A leading man for most of his career, he specialized in Westerns and film noir throughout the 1950s, in films such as John Huston's The Asphalt Jungle (1950), Nicholas Ray's Johnny Guitar (1954), and Stanley Kubrick's The Killing (1956). He became noted for supporting roles in the 1960s, perhaps most memorably as General Jack D. Ripper in Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964).
Rhonda Fleming was an American film and television actress and singer. She acted in more than 40 films, mostly in the 1940s and 1950s, and became renowned as one of the most glamorous actresses of her day, nicknamed the "Queen of Technicolor" because she photographed so well in that medium.
Sam Katzman was an American film producer and director. Katzman's specialty was producing low-budget genre films, including serials, which had disproportionately high returns for the studios and his financial backers.
The Golden Age of Piracy is a common designation for the period between the 1650s and the 1730s, when maritime piracy was a significant factor in the histories of the North Atlantic and Indian Oceans.
Walter Reed was an American stage, film and television actor.
Leatherwing, also known as Batman: Leatherwing, is a DC Comics Elseworlds story published in Detective Comics Annual #7 in 1994. It was written by Chuck Dixon and illustrated by Enrique Alcatena, who also devised the plot.
A swashbuckler film is characterised by swordfighting and adventurous heroic characters, known as swashbucklers. While morality is typically clear-cut, heroes and villains alike often, but not always, follow a code of honor. Some swashbuckler films have romantic elements, most frequently a damsel in distress. Both real and fictional historical events often feature prominently in the plot.
George J. Lewis was a Mexican-born actor who appeared in many films and eventually TV series from the 1920s through the 1960s, usually specializing in westerns. He is probably best known for playing Don Alejandro de la Vega, who was Don Diego de la Vega's father in the 1950s Disney television series Zorro. Lewis co-starred in Zorro's Black Whip and had a minor role in Ghost of Zorro before starring as Don Alejandro in the Disney series.
Frank Sidney Hagney was an Australian actor. He is known for his work on It's a Wonderful Life (1946), Ride Him, Cowboy (1932) and The Sea Beast (1926).
Tommy Farrell was an American actor who appeared in over 100 films and TV series between 1944 and 1983. He was best known for his sidekick roles in the Hollywood Golden Age.
Norman "Rusty" Wescoatt was an American supporting actor who appeared in over 80 films between 1947 and 1965.
John Sutton was a British actor with a prolific career in Hollywood of more than 30 years.
Fortunes of Captain Blood is a 1950 pirate film directed by Gordon Douglas. Based on the famous Captain Blood depicted in the original 1922 novel and subsequent collections of stories written by Rafael Sabatini, Fortunes was produced by Columbia Pictures as yet another remake about the notorious swashbuckler.
Double Crossbones is a 1951 American comedy adventure film distributed by Universal International, produced by Leonard Goldstein, directed by Charles Barton, and stars Donald O'Connor and Helena Carter. It was shot in Technicolor and was released on January 22. The story is of shopkeeper apprentice Davey Crandall becoming a pirate after being accused falsely of being involved of selling stolen goods.
The Golden Hawk is a 1948 historical novel by the American writer Frank Yerby. It was his third published novel, and was a popular success ranking sixth on the Publishers Weekly list of bestselling novels that year.