Brit Canuck
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About 'At Sword's Point' (Maureen O'Hara) (TCM.com)
An online article from Turner Classic Movies.
Excerpt:
*****
Soldier: "I will not fight with a lady."
Claire: "I am no lady when I fight!"
Those lines of dialogue from 'At Sword's Point' (1952) just about sum up the enormous appeal of Maureen O'Hara, who had been variously described as the "Queen of Technicolor" (for her stunning looks and gorgeous red hair), and the "Pirate Queen" (for her swashbuckling vitality and her ability to wield a sword or shimmy down a ship's mast as well as any man). O'Hara could be every inch a woman -beautiful, sensual, romantic - and yet completely hold her own in feisty matches with the likes of Errol Flynn and John Wayne (in fact, she was just about the only woman to stand so firmly toe-to-toe with Wayne). Although this unique position did little in the 1940s to earn her the kind of meaty dramatic roles offered her near contemporaries Stanwyck, Davis, and Hepburn, it made her an immensely popular heroine in the type of adventure movies that generally attracted boys (and boys at heart), at once an object of desire and a worthy ally in any fight.
Although little seen today, and never in the list of landmark American motion pictures, the movie captured the attention of film historian Jeanine Basinger: "The significance of At Sword's Point is that it clearly presents a woman as the equal of men in a man's world," Basinger wrote in A Woman's View (Wesleyan University Press, 1995). "She is, from the very beginning, both a woman and a swordsperson, and she doesn't have to stop being a woman to be good at dueling. No big deal is made of this, and in that fact lies the importance of 'At Sword's Point', a movie in which the genre is feminized more or less by just turning one character into a woman."
*****
The complete article from the TCM website:
http://www.tcm.com/thismonth/article/?cid=30046
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10/31/2009, 2:10 pm
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drace68
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Re: About 'At Sword's Point' (Maureen O'Hara) (TCM.com)
This movie continues to be a favorite. The opening scene with her fencing lesson (requisite establishing bit) went slow: yes, excellent wrist action, but the heavy dress?
Once she drew on her tall cavalier's boots, she was off to high adventure. If memory serves, in this flick she did more on-screen swordplay than in all of her other films combined.
A lady of talents, she proved herself a fine actress in "The Quiet Man."
drace68
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11/1/2009, 3:34 am
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Brit Canuck
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Re: About 'At Sword's Point' (Maureen O'Hara) (TCM.com)
Clips:
http://www.runboard.com/bswordswomen.f7.t9427
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11/2/2009, 3:52 pm
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