THE LAST OF ROBIN HOOD – The Review

As we bid goodbye to the Summer action blockbusters, we say hello once more to the serious slate of films looking to pick up award gold in the last few months of the year. And what better subject matter than the true story or the biographical or “bio-pic”? Maybe a good mix of the two, and since Hollywood enjoys celebrating itself why not tackle one of its greatest stars? Though not as highly merchandised today at contemporaries Bogart, Monroe, or Hepburn (either one), few stars shone as brightly in that golden age than Errol Flynn, king of the silver screen swashbucklers. Now Flynn was played by the similarly dashing Jude Law ten years ago in the Howard Hughes story, THE AVIATOR. And previously he was parodied wonderfully by Peter O’Toole as Alan Swann in the raucous comic gem MY FAVORITE YEAR in 1982 and by former Bond Timothy Dalton as the devious Neville Sinclair in 1991’s THE ROCKETEER. Now we need a modern actor to play that icon throughout an entire feature. What about the fella’ who played Flynn’s silent film swordsman predecessor Douglas Fairbanks, Sr. in a cameo for another big biopic, Richard Attenborough’s CHAPLIN, the pride of St. Louis, Kevin Kline? Done and done. And like the recent film LINCOLN, this doesn’t follow his whole life span, it focuses on those final two years or so. This tells the tale of the big tabloid scandal finale’ for THE LAST OF ROBIN HOOD.

The film begins in 1959 as reporters and photographers at an airport surround a young blonde woman exiting a plane. It is Beverly Aadland (Dakota Fanning), most recently the paramour of the just deceased screen superstar Errol Flynn. Unable to get through the crowd is her mother Florence (Susan Sarandon). In the days following the chaos, Florence dictates her daughter’s story to an eager writer. Two years earlier Beverly was an eager, aspiring actress working in a studio movie chorus line when she was spotted by Flynn (Kline). Approaching her thorough an intermediary, she is invited to Flynn’s lodge to “audition” for a role in a stage play. The line readings give way to a night of dining, drinking, and a clumsy attempt at seduction. When she returns home, Florence pressures her for details, but Beverly brushes her off. But Flynn pursues her, even after the nearly fifty year-old star is informed by his young assistant that Beverly is much younger than the twenty years she claimed. Much, much younger. But Flynn is not deterred and works his charms on Florence in order to begin a relationship with her daughter. Over the next few months the two are inseparable as they dominate gossip columns and covers of the scandal magazines. But will those researchers uncover the real”dirt” while Flynn tries to conceal his rapidly failing health? And once tragedy strikes, what will become of the Aadlands?

Since he’s the title character, the film’s main draw may be Kline as the staple of many a TV “late, late show”, although the Aadlands may have more actual screen time. He effortlessly captures the likeness, mannerisms, and vocal cadences of Flynn, especially interesting since Kline was over 65 during filming, while Errol was around 48 at the start of the affair. But it was a very hard lived 48 as his dashing good looks began to pay a price for the years of drinking and assorted debauchery (there’s actual color newsreel footage of the real Errol on his yacht that matches completely!). Flynn’s career was enjoying a slight renaissance thanks to dramatic supporting turns in TOO MUCH, TOO SOON (as old pal John Barrymore) and THE SUN ALSO RISES, but they seemed to merely capitalize on his boozing reputation. Kline shows us his frustration at being a world-wide winking punchline (he winces at “In like Flynn”), but does nothing to stop this image. In fact he adds and magnifies it, always with a drink in one hand and a his other around a shapely female waist. He still gives us that rascally charm (as when a very brave Kline prances about with only a fedora hiding his “sword’), but doesn’t shy away from the sinister darkness. The age revelation seems to just spur him on. The film hints that this may be a swipe at his prim, tyrannical New Zealand “mum”,while Kline shows us a man afraid of the approaching years. But these motivation don’t erase the disturbing, awkward assault at the end of the initial “audition”. Here Kline shows us a fading star hoping to absorb youth and relevancy from the adolescent blonde like a suave succubus. All the sympathy Kline affects still can’t dismiss that ugliness.

As for the Aadland ladies, Sarandon gives this horrendous stage mother a different twist. She’s uses passive aggression to push her baby toward the road to fame and fortune, a road that unfortunately twisted through Errol’s boudoir. But the actress tries to show us Florence’s inner sadness as she explains how her own aspirations were dashed after a night of youthful stupidity. Maybe she thinks her little girl’s fame will somehow trickle down to her like a splash of stardust. But by the final act, Sarandon relies on a sloppy, dazed drunk cliché’. Flo’s more than a tad pathetic, but she’s also a despicable thief that stole her daughter’s childhood in a demented chase for stardom, a stage mother/ agent/ pimp. Fanning as that “child-woman” is too much of a blank slate in many scenes as she is  pushed in different directions by mom and “the baron”. Is her willingness to be exploited by Flynn an escape route away from her domineering mother? Is this a need for a father figure since Mr. Aadland seems to fade into the background before vanishing completely? It’s tough to tell from Fanning’s portrayal as she often seems to be playing “dress-up” while chain-smoking during the almost constant game of “tug o’ war”. Her hard-rocking work in THE RUNAWAYS was more convincing

The producers make a valiant attempt to capture the look of the era, but without the ample budget of the recent HOLLYWOODLAND (set about the same time), the results resemble a made-for-basic-cable-TV-movie. A sequence of slides from Beverly’s visit to the African location of THE ROOTS OF HEAVEN is stilted bits of public park photoshop (at least they make the grade-z CUBAN REBEL GIRLS look cheap!). There’s some nice vintage cars, but a swanky party scene is merely a dozen extras doing the “bunny hop” around a tiny motel pool. Plus the script never draws us in. Scenes that should crackle, like Flynn trying to sell himself and Beverly as a “package deal” to Stanley Kubrick for LOLITA, never really pay off. The directors try to keep the story on track, but Flynn’s exit drains it of any energy left. They seem to be marking time till the “bio-updates” before the final credits and fade-out. But Kline very compelling as Flynn, who’s deserving of a better produced and scripted full-life and career biographical epic than THE LAST OF ROBIN HOOD. Sorry, “sport’!

3 Out of 5

THE LAST OF ROBIN HOOD plays exclusively in the St. Louis area at Landmark’s Plaza Frontenac cinemas