DVD from VCI Sept. 6, 2011
Christopher Columbus (1949) is finally getting a good R-1 DVD release. VCI, which has issued many British films on excellent DVDs, is releasing it, together with three other classic British films, on Sept. 6, 2011.
Although the film was previously released on DVD in the U.S. by Vision Video in 2005, the quality of that disc was fairly poor (it looked like it was copied from a videotape). Knowing VCI, this version should be very good. A photo gallery is the only extra.
This is the first-ever post on this site! Hasn't anyone ever seen this movie? When I first watched it over twenty years ago I was expecting the usual staid, hagiographic biopic, of noble Chris battling against odds to reach his goal for the good of mankind. Instead, the film surprised me by depicting Columbus in a more disreputable, probably accurate, and certainly human, light -- as a self-absorbed, self-interested egoist routinely lying, scheming and currying favor with anyone who can help him in order to attain his ultimate goals: power, riches, land and titles. Something of a genius, yes, but not a very admirable one. (The fact that he enslaved the natives of the Americas is also brought up and condemned.) Even at the fade-out Columbus is still a defiant, arrogant, egocentric and bitter man. Not at all what you'd expect, and very refreshing.
Fredric March gives one of the most fascinating performances of his career in the title role, and the rest of the veteran cast (all British, except for March's wife, Florence Eldridge, as Queen Isabella) is excellent as well. The film is well-produced in color, with good direction and a rousing, lively music score. It's consistently entertaining and unusual in its handling of the subject matter, if a bit talky at times. For anyone with an interest in history, and in historical films, this overlooked movie is well worth seeing.
It's also an odd subject for a British film. Columbus may be an American hero (though he never set eyes on what is today the United States), but of what particular interest is he to the British? But they did a far more objective, off-beat and realistic job than anything that might have come out of Hollywood in that era. This film is also vastly superior to and far more intriguing than those two dreadful, turgid, overblown 1992 biopics (Christopher Columbus - The Discovery and 1492: Conquest of Paradise) made to coincide with the 500th anniversary of the explorer's initial westward voyage.