Wednesday, August 30, 2017

The Four Feathers

A young man groomed to be an officer in the Queen’s Army fears himself to be a coward and, believing himself to be in the right, resigns just as his unit is being shipped off to fight the Khalifah in Sudan. Shamed by his friends, he must use his own means and backchannels to prove his mettle to them, his new bride, and himself.  Zoltan Korda’s The Four Feathers displays a radiant Technicolor decades ahead of its time, a fine cast of characters (including Ralph Richardson and C. Aubrey Smith), and a rousing telling of A.E.W. Mason’s story though some of it is diluted by many protracted sequences.

*** ½ out of ****