I’m so excited about this next movie. It’s a prime example of how much I enjoy doing the Disney Film Project. I love when I come across movies I’ve never seen before and am blown away by how good they are. For this project, I’m focusing on the story itself, including dialogue, character development, any subplots, how a story presents itself, the speed at which it moves, if it slows down unnecessarily, etc.
A Brief Summary
(Taken from D23)
Upon his arrival in the tiny fishing town of Godolphin where he will be track coach of the college team, Steve Walker inadvertently summons the ghost of the infamous Captain Blackbeard. The rascally old pirate causes him nothing but trouble, but, in the end, finally helps the coach win a track meet and a girlfriend and outwit some gangsters, which earns the ghost his desired eternal rest.
What works
- I like that there’s the text at the beginning of the movie that gives a very brief background on Blackbeard/Edward Teach. With that background snippet ending with the lines “This was followed by widespread joy when it became known the dread pirate had gone at last~~~.” and then a bit of a pause before the words “Or had he?” appearing on the screen, it really helped set the scene for the movie.
- Peter Ustinov (Blackbeard) is an absolute treasure in this. He is the best part of the entire thing. His voice, his actions, his dialogue, all the things.
- Richard Deacon is in this movie (after appearing in The Gnome-Mobile), and I quite enjoy his performance in this movie more than in that one. He wasn’t in the movie a ton as a supporting cast member (the Dean of Godolphin College), but I enjoyed it when he appeared on screen.
- Elsa Lanchester, as Ms. Stowecroft, is hysterical in this. She was so perfectly cast. While also being a descendent of one of Blackbeard’s crew (I’m pretty sure she’s not a descendent of Blackbeard), she is essentially the number one fan of Blackbeard, the president of his fan club if you will.
- Her performance in the final scene is tied for her best scene along with the scene where she is telling Steve (Dean Jones) about the history of Blackbeard and Aldetha’s curse.
- Dean Jones and Suzanne Pleshette have much better chemistry in this movie than they did in The Ugly Dachshund. Not to say that the actors themselves didn’t have chemistry, but more specifically their characters have better chemistry in this movie than in the last one.
- The main plot of the movie is that, or objective, is that Blackbeard needs to show that he has at least a shred of human decency in him in order to be freed from limbo. In addition to that, there are two main sub-plots that are introduced that work together to help solve the main objective: the ladies who live in the inn (I think it’s all the daughters of the buccaneers) need money to pay off the note for the inn to the bank before Seymour kicks them out, and the winning of the track team at the upcoming meet (I think they were going to cut the team if they lose again). Both of the subplots come together to serve and accomplish (or begin to accomplish) the main objective.
- Both of the subplots are important, but the track team subplot does serve more as the means for which the old ladies (as they’re commonly called in the movie) can earn the money to pay off their debt. Also it’s the reason for Steve (Dean Jones) even being in the town.
- Side note: While it didn’t help the old ladies in the end (due to Seymour being a villain), the track meet was crucial to Steve getting fully on board with Blackbeard. Which was great because them truly working together was necessary to accomplish both the old ladies getting their inn back and Blackbeard being able to redeem himself.
- There were two things that I applaud this movie for (amongst many): 1) Silky Seymour, the antagonist, has a pretty simple reason for wanting the island where the inn is located: it would be a jurisdiction-free location for a modern casino, where the law can’t bother him; and 2) that reason is explained very, very well by Suzanne Pleshette’s character Jo Anne, less than 20 minutes into the movie. Perfect, I love that.
- Something else that I really like is that how inanimate objects interact with Blackbeard. He can ride a motorcycle or drive a car; and then he can pick something up and interact with it. For example, he can pick up bottles of rum or whiskey and drink them.
- I like Elliot Reed as the commentator at the track meet. He’s hit or miss for me based on his previous Disney roles, but I thought he did an incredible job as the commentator. He was funny, he maintained good screen presence. It was a good role for him.
- Dean Jones, was so very, very good at looking like he was interacting with Blackbeard when we, the audience (and other characters), couldn’t see Blackbeard. One of the best I’ve seen yet.
- I loved the ending! Hands down one of the best ending scenes I’ve seen in the 1960s for Disney movies. Everything came together with minimal flaws. It was so enjoyable!
What may or may not work
- While I really like the pairing of Dean Jones and Peter Ustinov in this, on his own, Dean Jones’ performance shows that he’s been typecast.
- The presence of Mr. Purvis (the football coach) is frustrating to me. I get that he’s the football coach, that he coaches winning football teams, and I get that the dean of the college used “football profits” to buy new uniforms for the track team, but my dude. Focus on your own game, and lay off the negativity. Heaven forbid any other sport compete at Godolphin college with this coach around.
- With the presence of Elliot Reed in this movie (who played a similar(ish) character opposite Fred MacMurray in both The Absent-Minded Professor and Son of Flubber), I find that I actually prefer Elliot Reed’s character (get name) if only because he wasn’t as negative (or at least wasn’t as negative for as long as Purvis is negative) and he actually gets his comeuppance in those movies. Purvis doesn’t really get much other than the “satisfaction” (figure out better way to word this) of watching the track team win.
- With Aldetha being the one who cursed Blackbeard, and her portrait is shown repeatedly during the scenes before and shortly after Blackbeard’s appearance before Dean Jones, I thought she was going to have a greater importance in this movie and especially I thought she was going to appear at the end of the movie when Blackbeard had redeemed himself and reunited with his crew. But no, nothing more happened with her.
- Steve’s reactions during the track meet. It works and does the job well, as it served the purpose of getting Steve to finally accept Blackbeard’s presence, but it was a little tiring to watch. Not that it was bad and not that Dean Jones was bad, it just felt like it had been done before, so I was ready to move on to the next scene.
Honorable Mentions
- The design of the inn is so cool (it would be a dream travel destination for pirate fans), but too bad it’s not a real location.
- The scene at Silky’s place when Blackbeard is trying to get Jo Anne’s money in order to place a bet is one of the best scenes in the movie. While the conversation between Steve and Jo Anne is fine (there’s nothing really crucial about it, he’s just telling her how he got teamed up with Blackbeard), it’s just so funny to watch Blackbeard
- I really hope that the waiter who worked at Silky’s got either a big raise or quit to find a better job, because he went through the ringer because of Blackbeard (merely unfortunate accidents), and he was just trying to do his job.
- Blackbeard (and Peter Ustinov) is the best part of this movie. Hands down, as good as the rest of the cast is (and they are good), he is the tops. Every scene that he was in in this movie was 10 times better (feel free to increase that amount to infinity) because of his presence.
- Basically from the moment in the inn when Steve and Blackbeard head off to Silky’s place to win back the money (and Jo Anne joins them) to the end of the movie, I love it all. There is the scene earlier that I mentioned above about Blackbeard, but other than that scene, these ending scenes were my favorite.
Side Questions
- Does the end justify the means? I’m asking this just for fun, because I so enjoyed the movie. However, because Blackbeard is a ghost, when it comes to the track team and his assistance, didn’t they technically cheat? And, cheating aside, won’t that mess up the students in the future? If they’re never able to recreate these same results at the next meet, won’t that bring about future issues for the team as a whole? (Then again, who knows, maybe this win was the confidence booster they needed and they’ll be able to get much better, though probably not as good as when they were assisted by Blackbeard).
Would I watch this movie again?
- Oh, without question. It’s without a doubt one of the best movies of the 1960s, and it made me laugh so much throughout the movie. I would never turn down an opportunity to watch it again.
If you’ve seen Blackbeard’s Ghost, what are some of your thoughts? Share in the comments below!
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