A great example of something that could be given a very good remake. There's a story here that would work well today, as we still love the everyman turning out to be special, getting his training montages, etc. Bits of this reminded me very much of the first Kingsman.
But it is very dated. More so than a lot of films much older than it. Very technicolor, too many sets - the best parts are on the steppes near the end, outside. And the whitecasting and brownface is not just troublesome, but just terrible and confusing. E.g. two white guys are talking, in American or English accents, and you have to listen to the dialog to tell that one of them is supposed to be Indian. It's just stupid.
Errol Flynn is not too old, or anything but aside from being not even slightly Indian, is just not any good. He sticks out as being a very affected performance, whereas everyone else seems to actually act more or less.
Dean Stockwell is as good as a child actor gets, especially in this era. Not great, and he also has ZERO accent when purportedly totally disappearing into the Indian orphan role, so... meh.
But it is very dated. More so than a lot of films much older than it. Very technicolor, too many sets - the best parts are on the steppes near the end, outside. And the whitecasting and brownface is not just troublesome, but just terrible and confusing. E.g. two white guys are talking, in American or English accents, and you have to listen to the dialog to tell that one of them is supposed to be Indian. It's just stupid.
Errol Flynn is not too old, or anything but aside from being not even slightly Indian, is just not any good. He sticks out as being a very affected performance, whereas everyone else seems to actually act more or less.
Dean Stockwell is as good as a child actor gets, especially in this era. Not great, and he also has ZERO accent when purportedly totally disappearing into the Indian orphan role, so... meh.