BELOW – I have cropped the picture a little to see how it would have looked on the screen – although a still photographer is in the foreground – doing a good job I am sure We keep coming up with these Double Bill promotions – what about this one for two great adventures stories :- The Flame and the Arrow" is a colorful adventure film with a great closing shot: Lancaster swinging in a series of circular movements on metalwork high above the courtyard of an old castle... I am looking forward to the next two books in this series to find out where the next adventures will take Annika and Talvi.

I love Talvi for being so smug, confident with a bit of mischief whenever he talked to Annika. He is quite a protective and caring character. There are just so many good qualities about Talvi. From his past of what Annika knew about him, Talvi really grew from the shallow character he was before meeting Annika. The action is colourful if occasionally underpowered, the sets are fine, especially the castle interiors. Lancaster claimed to do all his own stunts but that seems very unlikely given the evidence and editing seen here, nevertheless it's his drive and energy which keeps the action moving. Mayo is fetching in her elaborate robes although her character seems too feisty to suddenly capitulate to Dardo's less than magnetic charms. Robert Douglas as the dashing but double-dealing Marquese and Frank Allenby as the tyrannical count are both very good in support. Want to know what the movie's about? Here's the plot: "Dardo, a Robin Hood-like figure, and his loyal followers use a Roman ruin in Medieval Lombardy as their headquarters as they conduct an insurgency against their Hessian conquerors." Dardo sends a message to the count, offering an exchange of prisoners, but Ulrich threatens to execute papa Pietro unless Anne is released. Dardo and the others race to the village and rescue Bartoli. Then Dardo learns from his aunt Nonna ( Aline MacMahon) that five more prisoners have been taken to hang in Papa's place. Dardo gives himself up to save the others and is hanged in front of his son. Ulrich takes the rest of the rebels prisoner, including the marchese.The final scene involves Dardo and Piccolo pretending to circus performers and in a Trojan Horse maneuver gain access to the castle where they use their acrobatic skills to defeat their oppressors. The studio claimed Lancaster did all of his own stunts and offered money if someone could prove otherwise. As it turned out, there were claims that some of the stunts were done by a stunt double but those claims were eventually thrown out of Court. During the 23rd Academy Awards for the films from 1950, it was nominated for Best Cinematography (Color) for Ernest Haller though the award went to Robert Surtees for King Solomon's Mines. A second nomination for the film for Best Musical Score of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture was received by Max Steiner. Still, the award went to Franz Waxman for Sunset Boulevard.

I loved all the characters he did. They all felt real to me and unique. I would defiantly listen to this narrator who I found to be really good. Burt Lancaster was a much more versatile actor than Errol Flynn; I could not, for example, imagine Flynn in "The Birdman of Alcatraz" or "Lawman" or "The Train". (Or if he had made a version of "The Train", it would have had had Labiche leaping from carriage to carriage across the roof of the train, fighting hand-to-hand duels against the Nazis in a desperate attempt to rescue the priceless artworks). Within his relatively narrow range, however, Flynn ruled supreme, and for all his athleticism Lancaster never quite brings to his role the panache and charisma that Flynn brought to his in "Robin Hood" and similar films. I think his later "acrobatic" films were better, especially "The Crimson Pirate", which had a far better, more amusing script, and "His Majesty O'Keefe," which provoked some serious sub rosa thought, in people given to serious thought. He kept fit for the rest of his life, even doing some clearly dangerous stunt work as late as "The Professionals" in 1968. Like some other tall, sinewy actors -- Clint Eastwood, for instance -- Lancaster seemed to have such delicate hands and fingers. What one character says of Leopold Bloom in Joyce's "Ulysses" could as easily be said about Lancaster -- "He'd have a soft hand under a hen." If this film gave a boost to his career, and it probably did, he certainly hit the ground running. Don't do it, Annika," he taunted. His eyes were no longer bright and charming, but dark and intense, yet they still twinkled. He was tempting, but was he harmful?The courtship of Annika and Talvi is so sweet. There are so many clues on how Talvi felt about Annika but Annika kept flying into the wrong conclusions about Talvi. Talvi only revealed what Annika needs to know when she is ready to listen. In Annika's defense, she is scared of what would happen when she returned to her own world. Talvi can't follow her there since he doesn't have a job there and has never been to the States. She is scared that she and Talvi might not have a future in the human world. Cannaday did do a good job with the alternate world, the family, the other worldly creatures, etc, in book 1 -- but all that goes away when Annika goes home in book 2. The screaming queen, the fairy jokes, the unquestioning acceptance of her friends -- without any real discussion -- these aggravated me even as I mourned the gold Cannaday left on the ground. One of the more enjoyable swinging-from-the-chandelier-with-a- -sword adventures made a la Erroll Flynn. A lively pace, loads of action, a witty-if-fluffy script, an enchanting score, good performances, and above all an incredible number of acrobatic stunts make this utterly enjoyable. Lancaster had been a circus acrobat before he got into films, and managed to work every stunt he could do into the script. He even balances and poses on the top of a 20-foot pole, for real. I'm still amazed that a guy that big could be so good. On the other hand, the hero is a douch-bag of epic proportions. He's petulant, spoiled, arrogant, cruel, and loves to brag about all the women he's had. He also enjoys belittling and torturing the woman he claims to love, and constantly lies to her -- when he isn't stomping out in a huff over some slight to his fragile ego. He is the most unlikable hero I've ever read.