Yellowbeard (1983)

Good , But It Is Overrated By Some

brilliant actors, brilliant editing

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

I remember when the movie came out, every critic hated it, so I didn't watch it. Until years later, my then-supervisor at work told us he saw and liked it, so I rented it. I didn't find the movie the abomination the critics said it was, but I didn't find it a laugh riot either.The plot is thin: the title character is a pirate released from prison, having hidden a hoard of his treasure on a remote island, and a variety of people pursue him as he goes after said treasure. There are some funny moments, but no big laughs, and there is a big variety of comic actors in the movie, yet the script doesn't allow them to shine. Passable, but at best only mildly amusing.

Yellowbeard, a pirate's pirate, is allowed to escape from prison to lead the authorities to his treasure. He finds that his wife neglected to tell him that he now has a son, 20, and shame of shame, an intellectual. The British Navy, Yellowbeard, his son, and members of Yellowbeard's old crew all go after the treasure.....This is a weird movie, so many famous faces in this, but what a dire script and poor narrative, and in some scenes you can tell the actors are bemused and in utter bewilderment.Chapman manages to just about hold the thing together, he's way over the top whenever he is on screen, and for a man of his age he's very fast and animated. The rest of the cast though are poor, and spout their lines like well paid automatons.Apart from the cast, this has nothing whatsoever to do with Monty Python, its very leftfield, but not amusing, has an eclectic array of characters, but no script. So if you are a fan of Python, you will be sorely disappointed.

The hardass Yellowbeard(who rapes and kills whoever he wants to) was the most dreaded pirate(and this fits in all the clichés of the subgenre… a man loses his hand and replaces it with a hook, we have a blind man(DareDevil has nothing on this guy, his acute hearing is impeccable) though it's both eyes, we get a mutiny, a boarding and a ship battle at sea, if only half of this takes place on the ocean, a treasure island and even a final showdown), and when he was captured, his booty had not been recovered. He finds that he has a son who doesn't take after him at all, and since his head contains the only map of it(…literally; it's actually tattooed on there), the two have to somehow work together(since he talks his father out of decapitating him). But his old his second-in-command, Mr. Moon, who betrayed him and got him thrown in jail, is along for the ride, and they're also being hounded by the Royal Navy. The biggest problem with this spoof, which certainly had potential, is how hit and miss the, at times remarkably uninspired, material is. We get jokes about the uptight British upperclass and sailors wanting women(or something to replace such) on the ships, along with swashbuckling(which can be genuinely engaging and exciting, some of the gags reminiscent of spaghetti Western saloon brawls), but there are obvious missed opportunities, and this does tend to either go for being funny or forwarding the plot, where a good comedy does both seamlessly. Even when things happen, sometimes they make so little impact on the audience that you find yourself forgetting that it occurred. The cast have their moments, such as Cheech and Chong, Chapman in the titular role, Cleese as the apparently helpless sightless man, and Idle as the face of the military. And the ending is definitely good. The filming and editing has its moments. There is a lot of violent, bloody and disturbing content and brief female topless nudity in this. I recommend this to the biggest fans of the Monty Python crew. 6/10

Peter Boyle's death yesterday brings to mind all his movies, including the rather silly "Yellowbeard". The movie features Graham Chapman as the title character, an 18th-century pirate who gets released from jail to help the British government find his treasure. That's when he finds out that he has a son who has little desire to be a pirate. From there, much of the movie consists of sword fights, one-liners, and Cheech & Chong. Overall, I thought that it was a little bit lamer than it could have been, but I agree with a previous reviewer that it's just neat to see all these people together in a movie. The flick is little more than a way to pass time, but there's a few laughs along the way. Also starring John Cleese, Eric Idle, Marty Feldman (in his final role; the movie is dedicated to him), Peter Cook, Kenneth Mars, Spike Milligan, and David Bowie in a cameo.And remember: he has a big yellow beard.