It gives the whole fight an arc that plays out just perfectly. As the fight goes on and Fairbanks realizes he's not teaching Colman a lesson, quite the reverse, he gets more and more desperate. But Ronald Colman's Rudolph is all steady confidence and resourceful physicality. You can just see how he's positive there's no way he can lose. Fairbanks' Rupert is so arrogantly sure of himself, facing this unassuming, older Englishman. I particularly love their sword fight at the end. Colman is the thoughtful one, so having Fairbanks be the grinning, cocky one works beautifully. Stewart Granger is a bit flippant and devil-may-care himself, so James Mason is a nice foil for that. I wouldn't want to mix casts, either, because each villain works specifically with their type of protagonist. I wanted James Mason to get it at the end, whereas I wanted Douglas Fairbanks Jr. is considerably younger than Ronald Colman, and is a cocky/arrogant/devil-may-care version. James Mason is an older Rupert, a wee bit older than Stewart Granger, and he makes Rupert more thoughtful, creepy, and downright evil. In the 1952 version, James Mason has the role.īoth are very good, but despite the fact that they're saying the same dialogue, each is an entirely different character. The biggest difference between the two versions is in Rupert's character. I have to say I liked both versions and would happily watch either again, but if I had to choose, I'd go with the 1937 version.
The only real differences are the cast, and that one film is in b&w, the other in color. Now, the 1952 is a remake that used the same script, so the dialogue, even the staging, etc. I viewed the 1952 version first, then the 1937 version. Since these two versions come nicely packaged on one DVD, I watched both of them this weekend.
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