The King's Thief

Plot synopsis:
James (Niven), the Duke of Brampton and the richest man in England, is so trusted by King Charles II (Sanders), he is able to have two of the King's loyal friends executed for treason. The second is the father of Lady Mary (Blyth). She travels from France to London to seek justice. While there, she meets Michael Dermott (Purdom), a soldier who fought to restore Charles to the throne.
He and many others were never paid for their services, unbeknownst to the King. He therefore turned highwayman. He and his comrades rob the Duke and come into possession of the Duke's notebook. In it are listed twelve rich and powerful people, as well as details of their possessions. Two names are crossed out; it does not take long for Michael to realize that the other ten are in peril for their lives. Michael first tries to blackmail the Duke, but without much success. A fence named Simon betrays his hiding place. Michael and his comrade Jack (Moore) escape from the Duke's soldiers, though Michael is wounded in the shoulder. Adventure abounds as the Duke tries to retrieve his property before it can be used against him.

Tags: violence, action, murder

Review:
Ok historical swashbuckler.
I watched The King's Thief for one reason only, and that was that I am a bit of a Roger Moore fan.
Alas, Roger isn't in the film very much, though what little he does he does well enough.
However, I still enjoyed it as an easy-on-the-brain swashbuckler, the type of thing that Errol Flynn might have starred in twenty years earlier.The plot is brisk and simple.
It involves a plot to overthrow the king of England, recorded in a notebook which falls into the hands of a woodland bandit.
The bandit is a bad man, but when he realises what is going on, he knows that he must do something to protect the monarch.
In this way, the villain actually becomes the good guy.
After a lot of swordplay and treachery, the bandit and his merry men save the king and catch the deceivers.There's not much to remember about the film once it's over.
There's one particularly suspenseful escape sequence, in which two bandits get out of Newgate prison, but besides that it kind of floats out of your head as quickly as it floated in.
All the same, this is fun.
It is the kind of movie your kids could watch without being exposed to blood and gore, sex and swearing.
Yet at the same time it deals with action, murder, treachery and brigandry.
I can't honestly recommend the film as a great viewing experience (it certainly isn't some kind of forgotten classic, so don't think it is), but if you want to pass an hour and a half on a Saturday afternoon, you could do a lot worse..
So-so Costumer/Swashbuckler set at the court of 17th century English king Charles II.
Set in Charles II kingdom , when he is restored to the British throne , after Cromwell's Republic , and stars a handsome highwayman named Michael Dermott (Edmund Purdom) who holds up a villain , short-tempered Duke (David Niven who delivers the most indelible sight , making a surprisingly effective nasty) and acquires a notebook , which , in due course , he realises is the key to latter's scheme to eliminate a series of noblemen , yet really in the service of his own will of power .
But Michael is caught and imprisoned along with his colleague Jack (Roger Moore) and , subsequently , both of whom escape across a risked getaway .
While Lady Mary's (Ann Blyth) father is innocently accused of treason and is executed along with other allegedly traitors .
It was carried out by the king's evil chancellor , the duke of Brampton , having them murdered and then expropriating their fortune , all under the auspices of protecting the throne from seditionaries .
Then , Lady Mary travels to London to meet the duke , but instead meets Michael and both of whom fall in love .
At the end Dermott becomes involved in a plot to steal the Crown jewels at the Tower of London and finds a worthy fencing adversary in the treacherous Duc of Brampton at an exciting final duel .Edmund Purdom 's spectacular and overwhelming adventure features impressive duels , elegant costuming , adequate production design , marvelous gowns , loads of action and full of Restoration Regalia .
Edmund Purdom is at his most agile and deft style and performs his own stunts .
Purdom was 31 when he made this movie .
Previously , Edmund made his best adventures and swashbucklers and played successes as ¨The student Prince¨, ¨The Egyptian¨, ¨Athena¨, ¨The prodigal¨ .
It was all downhill for Purdom after this , as he emigrated Italy where starred ¨B¨ films , Sword and Sandals , Spaghettis and minor epics as ¨Herod the Great¨, ¨Nefertiti , queen of Nile¨ , and followed successive flops as ¨Mr Scarface¨, ¨Big Boss¨, ¨Dr. Frankestein castle of freaks¨.
Nice acting by David Niven as Duke of Brampton , who has found a way of getting rich by accusing his enemies of treason and sequester their property .
And Ann Blyth plays the damsel in distress seeking justice for her late daddy as a colourless female lead .
Support cast is pretty well , plenty of familiar faces as John Dehner , Melville Cooper , Sean McClory , Alan Mowbray , Rhys Williams , Tudor Owen , Ian Wolf and a young Roger Moore and special mention for George Sanders as Charles II and leading a pack of Spaniels .
This King Charles II was also played in ¨Restoration (1992) by Sam Neill , and George Sanders also portrayed him in ¨Forever Amber¨ (1947).
Richly costumed , including luxurious gowns and in glamorous Technicolor cinematography by cameraman by Robert H.
Planck .
Breathtaking and luxury set design and art design by Cedric Gibbons , MGM's ordinary , though mostly interiors .
Here MGM turned out in a quiet corner of the backlot .
Thrilling and evocative musical score by the great maestro and prolific Miklos Rozsa .
The picture is not a masterpiece , being made in modest limits , with huge confidence and fair play by Robert Z Leonard .
Robert directed all kinds of genres , but especially dramas and musicals , such as : Clown , The Duchess of Idaho , Nancy goes to Rio , In the good old summertime , When ladies meet , Ziegfeld girl , Pride and prejudice , Broadway serenade , Girl of the Golden west , The firefly , The great Ziegfeld , Dancing Lady , Strange interlude , The Divorcée and a Mormon maid .
Rating : 5.5/10 , passable , a pleasing time-passer .
An enjoyable vision to brighten any day ..
Watchable but trite script prevents good cast from doing their best....
Even lavish sets and costumes and a background score by Miklos Rozsa can't save THE KING'S THIEF from the boredom of a banal script.
Lots of flashing swordplay takes place, but none of it has enough sizzle to make up for a tiresome story about a scoundrel (David Niven) who is keeping his thievery a secret from Charles II (George Sanders).The best sequence involves an adventurous escape from heavy chains in a prison dungeon and a final encounter in a tower holding fabulous jewels whereby our hero ultimately wins the approval of Charles II.David Niven does well enough as the charming thief, handsome Edmund Purdom is nimble and rugged enough as a swashbuckling highwayman, and Ann Blyth is pretty in her costume finery.
But none of them have more than cardboard characters to work with and the end result is a routine period adventure wasting a talented cast.Even Rosza's score is less memorable than most of his work for this kind of swashbuckler..
The King Is A Boob.
Filmdoms most notorious cad, George Sanders, makes a second film appearance as King Charles II of Great Britain, the first being in Forever Amber.
Charles II has come down in history as a pleasure driven hedonist, he's not called the Merry Monarch for nothing.
Hedonist he was, but that was also so much image management as well.
He had a good head on his shoulders, he survived the defeat of his father and a decade of exile to return as King in 1660.
The man that has come down to us in history is hardly likely to have been taken in the Duke of Brampton as played by David Niven.But that's what this film asks us to believe.
We're given no real reason why Charles has placed such confidence in the fictional Duke, but he has.
So Niven's got himself a real nice racket going, he denounces folks as traitors and Charles believes him and executes them.
And their property goes to him.In fact Niven's got himself as little black book with a Restoration Dun&Bradstreet rating on all the richest and loyalest of Charles's subjects.
The book unfortunately falls into the hands of highwayman Edmond Purdom.
Then Purdom makes an alliance of more than one dimension with the daughter of one of the late nobility, Niven's had done in, Ann Blyth.Niven looks very uncomfortable in the part of villain one of the few, maybe the only one he ever did.
Purdom and Blyth are reunited from the film they did the year before, The Student Prince, which was far better than this.
Sanders saunters his way through Charles II again.
If he had been this dumb, the Popish Plot which occurred later on in his regime would have knocked him off the throne.One of the dumber swashbuckler films I've ever seen.
Only for the quality of the players which includes Roger Moore as one of Purdom's gang does it get as high a rating as it does..
Enjoyable MGM historical adventure in vivid color.
This is an old-fashioned adventure movie, but there's nothing wrong with that!
Our time period is the 1660's or so, with Charles II on the English throne.
That the film is in color helps a great deal, allowing us to fully enjoy the fine costumes and the beauty of the leading lady.
There is some good swordplay and other good action scenes.
The knowledgeable film fan will spot a number of familiar faces in the cast.
This film puts many of the backlot locations of MGM to good use.
They're gone now; you can appreciate them here.
Recommended..
Palace tom foolery.
s'alright..
Glorious CinemaScope.
Some BIG BIG names, in their early days.
Roger Moore, waaaay before he was James Bond.
Ann Blyth.
George Sanders...
who could be hit or miss in his movies.
David Niven in another prim and proper English role.
Of course, Niven had ALSO played Bond in Casino Royale!
Period piece from England, on Charles II, who actually lived from 1630 to 1685.
History says he died of kidney illness, which may or may not have been brought on by poison.
In our story, Dermott is played by Edmund Purdom; fun bio on IMDb....
Purdom has the distinction of being the only actor to have his hand-prints removed from the sidewalk at G's Chinese Theater.
Swordfights.
Chases on horseback.
Brampton (Niven) is the evil dude, having his opponents knocked off with false accusations.
The usual palace adventures.
Its okay.
Fun to see some of those big names from back in the day, but the acting is all pretty stilted, as if they are reading off cue cards.
Directed by Robert Leonard...
one of his last films..
The film rests on the assumption that Charles II of England wasn't a big jerk...which he was..
I am a retired American who taught world history.
Although Charles II is shown as an all-around swell guy beset with disloyal jerks waiting to kill him, he was, in fact, a divine right king who managed to eventually lose much of the good will the English had towards him when the monarchy was restored.
The English were dreadfully sorry they chopped off the head of Charles I and were ready to make amends.
Charles, however, wasn't about to learn the lesson of his father-- and continued to behave as if he was never to be challenged in his role as king.
Things really were bad...so bad that when his brother, James II, took the thrown the English soon chased him out of the country and replaced the Stuarts with a Dutch king and queen.
So, as I watched the film, I had to laugh because it did re-write history just a tad!
But enough of a mini lecture...on to the film itself.The film is about yet another plot to kill the king by a disloyal bunch of jerks.
However, there is a small book with this information in it--and it's stolen by a group of highway men!
Are these crooks evil crooks or the Hollywood type who are intensely loyal Englishman who love their king?
Through the course of this film you'll learn!
So although it might not be all that accurate, is this an enjoyable film?
Like too many period films, the dialog is stilted and the picture lacks humanity and realism.
It looks like a stagy production and sounds like one too.
Watchable but hardly a must-see.