Humaira Grant It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

filippaberry84 I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Portia Hilton Blistering performances.

Rosie Searle It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

Charles Herold (cherold) I really liked the novel Ivanhoe, which told an interesting story, had some appealing characters, and made a very sincere attempt to fight against anti-Semitism. The movie of the book is less interesting in every way.The story is fairly straightforward and familiar to anyone who knows Robin Hood. King Richard is kidnapped, King John is in charge, Ivanhoe wants to save Richard and John wants him to stay gone.Ivanhoe tries to raise a ransom with the help of a rich Jew and his daughter, Rebecca. Rebecca falls for Ivanhoe, who is pledged to the equally lovely Rowena. In the novel, Ivanhoe was a stiff and Rowena was a pretty and bland. To this extent, the movie is true to the book, although Joan Fontaine makes Rowena slightly more appealing.In the novel, the Jews (and Ivanhoe's witty squire Wamba) were the main attraction. The father was in many ways the stereotypical rich, miserly Jew, but the book explained the Jews history and need to protect themselves, and he is ultimately a good man and a loving father. The movie makes him good and loving but far less complex.Rebecca was the true hero of Ivanhoe. She was beautiful and noble and honest and brave and everything a human being should be, which is why the ending is so affecting. In the movie, Rebecca, played by Elizabeth Taylor, is a nice, pretty girl who doesn't really do all that much. Ivanhoe is the only hero, and Rebecca is just another damsel.If you don't want to compare Ivanhoe with the book, you can also compare it with the Errol Flynn movie Robin Hood, which trods similar ground. Robin Hood is a rousing adventure with appealing actors and a lot of action. Ivanhoe is a talky period piece with generally unenthralling action whose best scenes tend to involve people making veiled or open threats. Ivanhoe is pretty typical of costume dramas in the 1950s; few of them were Ben Hur, and most of them were like this.My recommendation? Watch the Adventures of Robin Hood and read Ivanhoe.

georgewilliamnoble Made in 1952 when the studio system under irresistible pressure from television and was in terminal decline and beginning to fall falling apart.Along came Ivanhoe from then top old studio MGM. MGM's version of the old Victorian novel by the Scottish romantic writer Sir Walter Scott (Published In 1820). Is often compared with Warner's 1938 classic Robin Hood with Errol Flynn, and indeed the substance and the subject are indeed very similar.Now i am not going to try to argue that Ivanhoe is the better film clearly to all it is not.However given that Taylor (Robert)is no Flynn (Errol) and most of the supporting cast lack the charisma of the 1938 Warner film on most other considerations, however Ivanhoe compares quite favourably in my opinion.The colour is three strip Technicolour,the music by NIklos Rozna is in every way superb and so very profound in the film. Robert Taylor is very convincing as the heroic noble traditional hero "Ivanhoe", his nemesis played with some panache and some notable grace by that stalwart of Hollywood English rogue-ism by the wonderful George Sanders excels. The castle in the film is a full scale mock up and is very impressive complete with moat.Please look carefully at the stunt men throughout the film all are amazing but one particular fall into a moat from a great height had me quickly reaching for the remote. A personal delight from this movie is poor King John, sorry only a prince, cast as ever in a Hollywood film as lecherous, now here he is played by Guy Rolfe a British actor who worked later mostly on TV and his villainous loathsome sneers are just brilliant. The Freddie Young photography is marvellous and colourful, the action fast and perfectly thoughtless, the film is after all a Hollywood period fantasy. The film does however have it's low points, almost all concerning Elizabeth Taylor, she is dreadful throughout the film. Was she bored, going through a bad patch at the time, whatever but she seems to have no interest in the film or her role and boy does it show.In all, then a very entertaining film from the very last of old Hollywood and as such i believe it is one to savour.

Armand it is difficult to be a surprise. the classical novel, the perfect cast, the beautiful heroism , the images are pieces of a puzzle who must be a success. and that is the pure reality.but the film is real precious for its special flavor. sure, the fight scenes, the romanticism are marks of great films of period but the meeting between Joan Fontaine and Elizabeth Taylor, the Finlay Currie presence and the unique George Sanders are the pillars of a work who represents more than a beautiful film with lovely actors. and that is the basic ingredient of film - the precise measure , the admirable adaptation, the delicate tension and, sure, the romanticism because it is not easy to ignore Robert Taylor yesterday or today.

Bill Slocum Hollywood had so much fun with Errol Flynn's "Robin Hood" they tried to do it again, with this big-budget, star-studded adaptation of Walter Scott's famous novel. Yes, "Ivanhoe" is weaker in many departments, yet the good outweighs the bad and there's much to applaud here.Condensing a complex, sprawling novel into an hour-and-three-quarters could have been far worse. As it is, we a presented with the essence of the original story, its characters and contexts reduced to bare nubs. Director Richard Thorpe uses Scott's story lines as an excuse for plush settings and thrilling battle scenes that still pack a punch.Saxon Sir Wilfred of Ivanhoe (Robert Taylor) seeks the restoration of Richard to the throne of England, but Richard's brother John and his evil knights conspire to keep Richard in prison abroad. For Ivanhoe to succeed, he must not only rally Saxon support but gain financing from the Jews, one of whom, Rebecca of York (Elizabeth Taylor), has fallen in love with the noble, albeit Christian, knight.To start with the negatives, Robert Taylor is impossibly stiff in the lead role. For a long period, we are burdened not only by him but with the "comic relief" of Emlyn Williams' Wamba, a jester who Ivanhoe promotes to squire. Add to this a dead-on-arrival romance between Ivanhoe and the Lady Rowena (Joan Fontaine), who share only two dialogue scenes for the entire movie, and there's a lot of deadweight for this film to carry.But the good on offer here is stronger. The secondary cast is really exceptional, especially Guy Rolfe as dastardly Prince John and George Sanders as one of his henchmen. Sanders walks a fine line in this film, presenting a character who garners our empathy if not sympathy. He loves Rebecca, and with real heart, too, but he's pretty awful otherwise.The script, by Æneas MacKenzie, Marguerite Roberts, and Noel Langley, makes up for a choppy narrative with memorable dialogue. "Bid them enter in peace and depart in peace, or else depart in pieces," is the warning of Ivanhoe's father Cedric to a pair of imperious knights. Later, the Jew Isaac of York warns Ivanhoe "Money takes flight when might conquers right."Roberts got in trouble around this time with the House Un-American Activities Committee for her communist beliefs, causing her name to be dropped from the credits. While not at all preachy, one can read into "Ivanhoe" messages of both popular hysteria (Rebecca on trial for witchcraft) and the exploitation of the powerless (both Saxon and Jew). Anti-Semitism comes up often."To whose god shall a Jew pray for a Gentile?" Rebecca is asked by her understanding if disapproving father."To the same God who made them both," she answers.When Liz has a good line to deliver, she delivers it well. Fontaine is stronger, though, thoroughly winning as Rebecca's good-hearted but jealous rival and surprisingly holding her own against Liz for cinematic sexiness. I think Fontaine was far prettier in her thirties than in her late teens and early twenties.Add to these virtues Freddie Young's fantastic cinematography that seems to squeeze every inch from Alfred Junge's set design. You can get lost in such details as the purple raven perched on a skull that decorates the helmet of Sanders' knight character, or the Bayeux-style tapestries that cover the walls in many scenes.If only the film had a better lead, and maybe a few more minutes to run. Alas, you can only make a classic like "Robin Hood" once, or it wouldn't be a classic. Still, this is an engaging time-passer with some things about it worth seeing, hearing, and remembering.