Wonderful Movie

Thanks for the memories!

The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

Jean Peters was a dedicated and versatile actress who was one of the early leading ladies who could fake an accent. Spaniards do not have a distinct accent when speaking English but it is noticeable (I've been to Spain over 50 times on business). I feel Jean Peters carried this film, although it was perfectly suitable for Tyrone Power and he acted admirably, but where was the accent. Just like John Wayne, but unlike Marlon Brando, Tyrone could not fake an accent. Seriously, Tyrone Power was a better actor than John Wayne. Need I say more......who wasn't? The only disappointment to me was that there was no evidence that the Captain and Catana (Peters) ever crossed the Atlantic. It would have added reality to the film had there been even a brief launching of the ship and crossing of the Ocean.

I usually don't review 40's and 50's Technicolor Blockbuster Star Vehicles, unless they really stand out for some reason. Captain from Castile does just that - the last scene, with Cortez assembling his forces for an assault on Tenochtitlan, begins mildly enough - a natural extension of the plot - but, as the forces begin marching and the pep talks start, the rails start shaking.First the Spanish Priest begins extorting his small congregation with classic American values: equality, the sanctity of the individual, etc. and then Cortez, well-played by Cesar Romero, suddenly jumps character and starts sounding like Lincoln at Gettysburg, as though his goal is to empower each and every one, both native and Spaniard, with their inalienable rights as human beings.What?!!!It's been a long, long time since I first saw Captain and I certainly didn't remember this final coda or the irony of characters based on some of the most barbaric citizens of the most hypocritical, top-down and dysfunctional Monarchy in Europe laying claim to 18th Century liberal humanistic values.I did remember it as a typically well done Technicolor extravaganza: Tyrone Power as an attractive hero navigating a culture antagonistic to his personal, innate humanistic values. Prince of Foxes and The Black Rose come to mind.In Captain, that conflict is downplayed in favor of 'Epic Scope' and Power's character actually seems to like and approve of Cortez as an admittedly greed-driven but basically decent good-guy whose heart is in the right place, once you get past his greed, genocidal tendencies and psychopathology.For most of the movie that actually works thanks to Romero's performance and the script's soft-soaping of Cortez's negative personality traits. But those last five minutes ...How in God's name could you even try to elevate Spain's or Cortez's trampling of the New World as a positive expression of liberal or humanistic values? That's where the one star comes from: the offensive and virtually obscene attempt to characterize someone like Cortez as a hero rather than the pathetic psychopath he and his fellows really were.Hollywood has always played fast and loose with (factual) history in favor of dramatic impact, The King's Speech being the latest of brilliant examples, but Captain from Castile's script is a script too far.

I first saw this film as a child, around 1950, and was bitterly disappointed when it ended just at the point where it was getting interesting. Like most reviewers, I found that too much time was wasted on the melodrama and introduction of the characters, at the expense of the action. To end the film without the siege of Tenochtitlan and the battle along the causeway cheated the viewers who had sat through two hours of the build up. The whole reason for going to the New World was to escape Spain, and make their fortune, and in the case of Hernan Cortez, conquer the New World and get very, very powerful. As the film was made just after WWII and one would have expected a victorious war film set in 1518, but for whatever reason, they just cut the story short and created an anticlimax.The Technicolor was excellent and the locations added authenticity, but I was puzzled by all the native people with beards and mustaches. I had always thought that they lacked facial hair and the 26 years since the New World was first sighted was hardly enough to have resulted in a Mestizo population, especially as the first settlements were in the islands. We were told that the Mexicans worked closely with the filmmakers to ensure authenticity, so maybe they did have beards! I was almost prepared to see sombreros! The film at least addressed the conflicting motives for conquest, God and Gold! We also have to remember that Mexico was a long way from Spain, and Cortez was out for what spoils he could grab, the acceptable way to make one's fortune since time began. The fact that other peoples' possessions are not fair game to grab is a problem that we are only just beginning to recognize, and even today, pity the people who find themselves living on property standing atop an oil field or in the way of progress of one form or another.I would like to see Samuel Shellebarger's book remade in the form of a Mexican Telenovela where they have no problem with taking 100 hours to tell the story. Perhaps then we would also hear the events from the native perspective about how hard they fought, rather than the impression we are given that they surrounded at the first sight of the Conquistadores.

In watching this film, I was amazed how little they explained of the historical aspects. It reminded me that in 1948, students still learned and knew more of history than is common today and would have already had a knowledge of the time period.The dangerous mix of secular and religious motives in the Inquisition, different motives between the Conquistadores and the priests, the burning of the ships under Cortez, the addition of native Indians siding with the Spanish (as shown by their ever growing presence with the Spanish armies, but never actually discussed) and the march of the Spanish through Aztec territory followed history to a T.Much of the later Indian culture was destroyed from differing immune systems. Namely, germ strains that Europeans had resistance to such as small pox, decimated the native populations. This movie takes place before that, and does so very accurately.