THE PIRATE: Blu-ray (MGM, 1950) Warner Archive

 Love it or hate it, Vincente Minnelli’s The Pirate (1948) remains a fascinating, if sincerely flawed experiment in MGM’s musical mélange. In its heyday MGM, as Minnelli, reveled in taking chances. If money was required to improve something, it was granted. If sneak previews necessitated re-shoots, the work was budgeted into the finished product. As long-time editor, Margaret Booth once said, “We didn’t make bad pictures. We made good pictures. We went to previews and corrected the pictures.” Alas, The Pirate, with its fanciful take on the swashbucklers of yore, Minnelli’s chronic tinkering to restructure its scenes and songs, and tragically crumbling work/home relationship with his star – Judy Garland (who also happened to be his wife) is still a picture in need of some improving. An invigorated stab to expand the boundaries of the musical/comedy, it unfortunately sank under the weight of Minnelli’s creative verve; also, rather ironically, from a lackluster score that, despite a few hummable tunes, fell well below par for the usual uber-wit of its composer, Cole Porter. That The Pirate so miserably failed to find its audience in 1948 speaks more to the changing landscape in post-war America’s cinema-going tastes than any genuine artistic failing. In retrospect, the chief problem with many MGM movies coming out after the war was studio raja, L.B. Mayer’s desire to homogenize the picture-making process – creating formulaic escapism. During the war years, a picture like The Pirate might have avoided such scrutiny. After the war, its froth came on too strong for the increasing cynical temperament of the public. Worse, Metro’s homegrown musicals were notoriously falling back on the threadbare 'boy meets girl' scenarios of yore with few, if any deviations. Thus, audiences became complacent, if increasingly resistant to the ‘ho-hum’ of it all – the situations remaining the same, merely augmented by different songs. The erosion of the musical’s popularity was devastating to MGM, left with a roster of ‘more stars than there are in the heavens’ suddenly to scramble for their bread and butter. The more malleable talents, like June Allyson and Van Johnson, were quickly plugged into other genres; dramas, comedies, etc. while the remainder were curiously placed in musicals of questionable integrity with ever-diminishing returns.

One of the studio’s biggest box office draws – and, indeed, the musical’s salvation and driving force – was Judy Garland. Alas, by 1948, Garland had already been fed through Metro’s gristmill once too often; her high-strung nature, exacerbated by a chronic addition to studio-sanctioned amphetamines and diet pills to keep her creative juices churning at an alarming pace. Garland had already suffered one nervous breakdown and a suicide attempt by the time The Pirate went before the cameras. Worse, the actress’ search to find peace of a kind, through marriage had failed a second time. Having come home to discover the bisexual Minnelli in bed with another man, Garland was bitterly torn in her affections. Indeed, Minnelli at the outset of their courtship, had appeared wholly invested, and, to have her very best interests at heart. As Garland home life crumbled, her creative spirit began to fail. Garland repeatedly showed up late to the set, if, indeed she came to work at all, leaving Minnelli, crew and cast to shoot around her. Her paranoia, aggravated by the pills and wraith-like condition, to leave her physically depleted each day, created chronic delays as Garland grappled with crippling – some would suggest ‘unreasonable’ – insecurities in her dressing room. The symbiotic union between star and director, having blossomed only a few years earlier on the set of Meet Me in St. Louis (1944), was now a daily battleground where Garland seemed to be constantly at war – mostly with herself – but also, bucking Minnelli’s desire to create a truly unique movie experience. And some of this unease, undeniably, rubbed off on Minnelli, who began rethinking the story and songs, reworking each until the souffle in his mind’s eye began more directly to resemble a cinematic gumbo of mislaid opportunities.

Yet, The Pirate was something quite different - a lavishly mounted satire of the Douglas Fairbanks Sr./Errol Flynn swashbuckling hero, turned comic fop from a travelling circus. Tragically, The Pirate may have been reaching too high in its aspirations for greatness, and, in the opposite direction. In retrospect, something remains ‘off’ about this movie, its spirit of adventure overshadowing its limited appeal as a musical. Despite some iconic songs, including ‘Mack the Black’ and ‘Be a Clown’ – the latter, later, ripped off by Arthur Freed for Singin’ in the Rain (1952) as ‘Make ‘em Laugh’ – The Pirate just does not feel like a musical – one made at MGM or elsewhere. The screenplay by Albert Hackett and Francis Goodrich is awkwardly battling the more adroit sophistication of S.N. Behrman's original play. Garland is miscast as Manuela, a green girl guarded from outside influences by her stern, Aunt Inez (Gladys Cooper). Manuela’s marriage has been arranged to the wealthy governor, Don Pedro Vargas (Walter Sleazak). But the portly Vargas is no match for Manuela’s lurid dreams about the dashing rogue of her imagination, Mococco the Pirate. Enter Serafin (Gene Kelly), a traveling clown and acrobat touring this seaside village with a theatrical troop. Recognizing he will win Manuela’s heart if he can convince her that he is ‘Mack the Black’ Mococco – Serafin dons his best disguises and trips the light fantastic in her honor. But will Manuela be enough of an innocent to fall for both the act and him?

At first, yes - particularly after Serafin manages to hypnotize the girl. She breaks free of his mind-control, however, and later learns the truth. Determined to make him pay for his lies, Manuela allows Serafin to believe he is still her lord and master, then lowers the boom – literally - all but demolishing half the house in the process. Angered by Manuela's obvious affections toward Serafin, Vargas exposes the truth to her and the town's folk. He was Mack the Black Mococco in his youth. Since those heady days of his infamous piracy he has lived obscurely as a wanted man, supported by his fabulously ill-gotten gains. As he remains hunted, Vargas is now arrested, leaving Manuela to pursue Serafin. But before she can, Serafin interrupts the show. We fast track to a moment in the not so distant future, only to discover – rather awkwardly, Manuela has joined Serafin's travelling menagerie. These two properly cured hams now indulge in a spirited rendition of 'Be A Clown' (previously made a tour de force dance routine for Kelly and the sadly under-used Nicholas Brothers). The number, with Garland and Kelly in clown’s garb, is charming to a point – complete with painted faces, fuzzy noses, and trick ears that wiggle on cue. But the whole moment seems a grotesque ‘tack on’ to close out the picture on a musical note, as though Minnelli is acutely aware – first, the musical portion of his program is sorely lacking, but also, because, having come to the end of the picture’s run-time and his own threadbare patience, he has no time to consider a more succinct and fitting conclusion to this grand experiment.

The artistic crisis – if one can call it that - of The Pirate is decidedly its lack of heart. Critics of the day were quick to suggest Garland and Kelly were phoning in their performances, blown to hideously silly proportions. Yet, the ‘over-the-top’ quality of their byplay was deliberately conceived by Minnelli. This is not a swashbuckler with music, but a spoof of the swashbuckler – with musical interludes to showcase Garland and Kelly’s innate talents. And, on that superficial level, at least, the picture has several high points of interest to offer. Given Garland's chronic addiction was getting the better of her throughout this movie’s arduous shoot, she manages nevertheless to radiate a delicious sex appeal in several scenes, and, cavorts with finesse belying her affliction. Garland’s best moment is ‘Mack the Black’, staged against a blazing fire (shades of the similarly staged ‘March of the Doagies’ – a lavish production number cut from the final release print of 1946’s The Harvey Girls). Belted out with gaudy dispatch, presumably while under hypnosis, Garland reinvents her character’s wallflower persona as a sexy chanteuse, startling the womanizing Serafin with her penetrating stare. If Garland’s transition from naïve waif to smoldering sexpot appears effortless enough, then Kelly’s transformation from Serafin – the clown, to Mococco – the stud is a bit harder to digest. Without question, Kelly is at his athletic best as the swarthy womanizer whom we first meet, cooing Cole Porter’s sultry ‘Nina’ into the ear of any attractive peasant girl who will listen, briefly appearing as if to ingest a lit cigarette to smother one raven-haired lass in kisses, before pressing it against his lips for another sinful drag: amiable theatrics from a bona fide ham. And Kelly acquits himself of the spectacular competition dance, a showcase for the Nicholas Brothers – Fayard and Harold, who otherwise, and regrettably so, have absolutely nothing to do in this movie. He is less successful when he tries to emote grand amour to Garland’s Manuela, already savvy of his betrayal and preparing to pounce upon his deception with all manner of decorative implements being flung at his head.

The Pirate is a potpourri for Minnelli who is at his most flamboyant in these studio-bound faux tropical settings. A set designer before he was a director, Minnelli floods the screen with a captivating frothiness that steadily recedes into a fiery/murky darkness; the autumn harvest, coming in the form of a truncated ballet in which a muscular Kelly, appropriately oiled and dressed in black, assails the mane of a tall ship, surrounded by deeply sinister orange flames in as violent shades of burgundy and magenta, the blaze reflected in bright yellows in Kelly’s eyes. The sequence is miraculous, but sadly out of place. It has good things in it, but none to achieve total artistic cohesiveness with what has come before, or to immediately follow it. The fantasy is too much for the pseudo-reality that bookends the piece. Henceforth, The Pirate is a flop because it never rises above such stylized moments with anything more tangibly engaging than the aforementioned ‘boy meets girl’ plot. This fallback on tradition, sadly, is not enough for this musical, particularly when the songs here are parceled off over long stretches of exposition, leaving this flimsy narrative to do all the heavy lifting. Late in the picture, Garland sings 'Love of My Life' - a turgid ballad, well below par for Cole Porter, failing to captivate and insincerely strained, considering Manuela has already discovered Serafin is a fraud. Thus, The Pirate despite its nobler aspirations, is utterly flawed in its execution.

We have yet to reflect on Cole Porter, and pause now to suggest the maestro of so many iconic hits was hardly up to task on The Pirate. Porter, the only surviving child, born to wealth and privilege, and, something of a musical protégée, coaxed on by a domineering mother, learned the violin at age 6, the piano at 8, and, wrote his first operetta at 10; a jazz age/modern-era Mozart if ever one existed. As the family wanted Cole to become a lawyer, he was sent to Yale where he instead managed to write over 300 songs that include the school’s football ‘fight’ song – still sung today. A switch in vocation and schools, to Harvard, set Porter’s feet upon his chosen path. At the outset of WWI, Porter departed for Paris where, apart from his participation in the war’s relief fund, he managed to throw lavish house parties, scandalous for their openly gay and bisexual activity and recreation drug use. It was at one of these vintage soirees Porter met the well-heeled, Louisville, Kentucky-born divorcée, Linda Lee Thomas whom Porter would eventually marry. Despite the polarity in their sexual preferences, the marriage was a happy one until Thomas’ death in 1954. And throughout this time, Porter lived resplendently on an inheritance, writing songs at his wife’s insistence and shows that would garner him a hallowed place in musical theater folklore.

1934 provided Porter’s landmark – Anything Goes; the first of five collaborations with star, Ethel Merman, whom Porter positively adored. Suddenly, Porter’s song catalog was being featured on the radio, warbled by the legendary talents of his age. Hollywood’s interest in Porter created a minor problem as the lyrics of some of his best-loved songs had to be tempered to conform to their Production Code of Ethics. And Porter’s biggest shows – despite their runaway popularity with audiences – never seemed to translate well to film, or, for that matter, arrive intact.  At the outset of WWII, the Porters closed their Paris home and relocated to a stately abode in the Berkshire mountains, near Williamstown, Massachusetts, with Cole dividing his time and interests between New York and Hollywood. Interestingly, Porter’s post-war career – although marked by some long-running Broadway hits, failed to generate any enduring pop tunes; their success, seemingly buoyed by Porter’s reputation, and, of course such iconic talents as Merman, Betty Hutton and Danny Kaye, plugging his work. Immortalized on celluloid for Warner Bros.’ Night and Day (1946) – a highly fictionalized bio-pic, Porter dove into working on The Pirate, presumably to resurrect his slightly sagging reputation as a songsmith. It was not to be.

And although Porter was to experience a renaissance with his subsequent Broadway efforts, the Tony Award-winning Kiss Me Kate (1948), followed by Can-Can (1952), and Silk Stockings (1955), the last strike of paydirt came in Hollywood with his original score for MGM’s High Society (1956) – yielding his final hit song, ‘True Love’.  By 1958, Porter’s decadence had caught up with him, creating severe ulcers on his right leg, resulting in amputation. And while long-time friends rallied to his side, suggesting Porter would return to form better than ever, he would, in fact, never commit another melody to paper. Instead, the last 6 years of his life were spent in quiet seclusion, confined mostly to his memorabilia-filled penthouse in New York, with occasional departures to his estate in the Berkshires and infrequent retreats to California for his health. Porter died of kidney failure on October 15, 1964, in Santa Monica, age – 73, his body returned to his home town of Peru, Indiana, and buried between his wife and father.

And if The Pirate does not represent Porter’s art at its finest, it does, in fact, allow us the opportunity to experience second-tier Porter at its very best. Despite her personal demons, Judy Garland is in excellent form, while Gene Kelly’s dancing requires no substantiation of both its grace and finesse. I really do not think enough has been either said or written about Garland’s resolve to remain a professional, in spite of the incalculable setbacks in her private life that, otherwise, would have sent a less resilient person to the asylum for good. The delays she frequently put cast and crew through were never out of disregard for the work or her fellow thespians, but rather something of a coping mechanism in which Garland repeatedly staved off crippling anxiety to put on a good front for the cameras. Minnelli’s intuitive use of Technicolor to evoke mood ensures there is always something intriguing to look at, even if the Goodrich/Hackett screenplay falters in the telling of its tale, and Porter’s score, intermittently, bogs down, rather than buoying, the picture’s plot. It’s difficult to criticize such impeccable talents toiling in unison to will a classic from the mire, but in the end, The Pirate remains an imperfect and oddly misshapen musical, strikingly void of the essential merriment to sustain its farcical premise.

There’s better news for the Blu-ray. In 1992, MGM/UA Home Video created a rather impressive video master of The Pirate for LaserDisc. Alas, when Warner Home Video (inheriting the catalog) elected to release a DVD edition in 1999, the results were woefully below par; the rich hues of Technicolor replaced by a wan and faded image that belied all the hard work gone into the aforementioned effort on LD. Worse, the Warner disc was riddled in edge-enhancement, pixelization and age-related dirt. It just looked awful. Well, you can forget about all that now. Your DVD is officially a coaster for your drink – not that its reputation ever fared much better from the outset of its minting. But now, the Blu-ray from the Warner Archive (WAC) has come home, and, owing to WAC’s usual fortitude in offering collectors the very best possible image quality available, the results herein will positively blow even the most discerning videophile away. Sourced in 4K – dumbed down to 1080p – from revitalized elements and a new scan, obviously to have been the benefactor of some major restoration, what we have here is a revelation.

Color saturation, for one, is astounding with rich and vibrant hues that positively pop. Manuela’s red dress positively explodes in ravishing Technicolor, while the blistering flames during ‘Mack the Black’ writhe with exceptionally nuanced variations of orange, red and yellow. Minnelli’s exceptional use of color is given its full breadth herein. Contrast is excellent and a light smattering of film grain looks very indigenous to its source. The 2.0 DTS audio is sublime. Extras from the DVD have been ported over and include a comprehensive audio commentary from noted Garland biographer and historian, John Fricke, a vintage ‘making of’, two shorts, and ‘Mack the Black’ remixed in stereo, plus audio outtakes that include behind the scenes coaching of the stars by associate producer, Roger Edens, several radio junkets, and, finally, the movie’s original theatrical trailer.  Bottom line: despite the exceptional talents that went into its creation, The Pirate will never be a stellar example of the MGM musical at its zenith. The Blu-ray, however, is a pluperfect example of all that the standard hi-def technologies can yield, when afforded the proper care, time and money. Highly recommended on that score alone!

FILM RATING (out of 5 - 5 being the best)

3

VIDEO/AUDIO

5+

EXTRAS

3