Pluskylang Great Film overall

Intcatinfo A Masterpiece!

Kailansorac Clever, believable, and super fun to watch. It totally has replay value.

Taraparain Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

mark.waltz Take a red-headed Caliph's daughter and pair him opposite a very American looking Arabian Knight and you have the type of sword and sandal adventure that had the kiddies flocking in on Saturday afternoon but left critics cold. Universal was the king of these types of films from the early 40's through the mid 1940's when the Italians took over, leading Peter Graves to ask that question, "Billy, do you like movies about gladiators?" It isn't just the obvious Caucasian casting, but the many clichés used over and over since the days of Sabu, Jon Hall and Maria Montez. At least in those films, you know that the creator's tongues were in their cheek. Here, the writers were just looking for a fast buck, and thanks to the quarters of the adolescent crowd, many of these films scored big. There are too many of them, so in film history now, they all meld together in a stew of sameness.The saga is based upon the legend of the sword of Damascus which gives the man who is able to pull it out of a wall the "power of many thrones", much like the legend of King Arthur and the sword of Camelot. All is fine with that, but with Rock Hudson as the hero and red-headed Piper Laurie as the feisty "lady in distress", you know that nobody gave much thought to reality in casting. At least with Montez, Sabu and Hall, they looked the parts, and with Tony Curtis as "The Prince Who Was a Thief", you had a "Hellzapoppin'" like spoof of the genre that audiences still laugh both with and at today.Colorful photography barely hides the fact that the hanging props of the lavish sets are obviously cheaply made and look like things you'd see hanging in an elementary school classroom. They do not at all give the impression of the ancient middle east, coming off as ostentatious and gosh rather than remotely sophisticated. The villains are one-note, the sidekicks silly rather than comic, and the dancing girls more off of Broadway than of Bagdad. The action sequences are exciting, but some moments seem more like filler than like plot development. This is the type of film that a realist might buy popcorn to eat during the movie but may find themselves throwing at the screen as the film drags on.

MartinHafer "The Golden Blade" is an embarrassingly bad film. The most notable thing is that NO ONE belongs in the film, as it's set in ye olde Baghdad--but it's filled with the whitest actors Universal Pictures could find! They hired the likes of Rock Hudson, Piper Laurie, George Macready and Gene Evans to play Middle Eastern Muslims--and I wonder why they didn't also include Wally Cox and Phyllis Diller as well! Now had the only problem been the casting, it could have still been a nice little adventure film. However, the dialog and characters simply suck. No one talks like real people and the dialog sounds like a 12 year-old's conception of olde tyme talking! Additionally, the characters are amazingly one-dimensional. The worst is the anachronistic Princess (Laurie) who acts like a spoiled child...and a rather annoying one at that. The film is dumb and probably offensive to anyone from that region. I can understand why this film is relatively unknown today--it deserves to be that way.

SimonJack Who could picture in their minds Rock Hudson swinging from drapes, jumping over balconies, or subduing the sultan's guards with his sword? But that's just what Universal gives us in "The Golden Blade." He's surely not on the scale of Errol Flynn, Ty Power, or Stu Granger, but Hudson does a nice swashbuckling turn here. The Golden Blade is a light-hearted movie of fiction set in a mythical Baghdad. It has some skulduggery that is usual for these desert tales of the mid-20th century. Hudson's physical trysts combine with the energy and rebelliousness of a princess (Piper Laurie) who is always sneaking off to see the world outside the palace. And to do good turns with the people that endear them to her. The plot isn't complicated and the script is just average. The color, cinematography and costumes add to the enjoyment of the movie. It's not serious filmmaking, but the cast seem as though they are enjoying their craft. Viewers should do likewise. Just sit back and enjoy the color, action, humor and romance of this light but entertaining film.

bkoganbing When Universal Pictures made those Arabian Nights films with Jon Hall, Sabu, and Maria Montez in the Forties a lot of expensive period sets were built on that lot. The rule is get use of them, so even after Universal became Universal-International in the Fifties with a crop of new leading men like Jeff Chandler, Tony Curtis, and Rock Hudson they still kept cranking out those old tales set in the Caliphate of Old Bagdad.This film is a reworking of the Christian Sword and the Stone legend into the Arabian Nights. Haroun of Basra played by Rock Hudson comes upon his dying father in an ambushed caravan and he's given a mission to find the murderer who is also trying to stir up trouble between Basra and Bagdad. While on the mission he comes upon a magic sword in a marketplace and discovers he's invincible with it. He also comes upon the Caliph's daughter the blond Piper Laurie who likes to roam the streets of Bagdad incognito to sample public opinion and get a taste of adventure to the annoyance of her father Edgar Barrier.But there's treason afoot in the palace with Grand Vizier George MacReady and son Gene Evans who want the throne for themselves. Evans wants to marry for it which bothers his mistress Kathleen Hughes a lot.During the course of the film the magic sword is stolen from Hudson and later when Evans was trying to use it, he rammed it into the palace wall and no one can get it from the stone foundation. I'll give you one guess who can.The Golden Blade is the average Universal Arabian Nights epic with a lot of gaudy color cinematography, with a bigger budget you'd think it was a DeMille film. No better or worse than some of what Universal was putting out in those years. I'm sure Piper Laurie felt the same as Maureen O'Hara did in these kind of films, Maureen in her memoirs realized how ridiculous a redhead was in the Middle East. George Macready was one of the best movie villains ever in just about any kind of genre be it western, noir, sand and sandal, you name it. He does a wonderful job mouthing some lines that were quite frankly ridiculous with earnest conviction. By the way if you were to make a golden blade it would not be much use to you if it weren't enchanted. As any geologist will tell you, gold is the softest and most malleable of metals, remember in the days of gold coin people would bite into it to see if it was genuine and if the coin had teeth marks, you knew it was good. The Golden Blade is entertaining enough and not to be taken too seriously.