Rating:  -
Columbia Pictures present "BLACKHAWK:FEARLESS CHAMPION OF FREEDOM" (1952) (263 mins/B&W) (Dolby digitally remastered) --- is a 15-Chapter Columbia Movie Serial starring Kirk Alyn, Carol Forman, John Crawford, Michael Fox, Don C. Harvey & Rick Vallin, relive those thrilling days week after week venue brought you to the theater, as you were mesmerized in your seat waiting for the final chapter ... exciting action within 15 episodes from the Columbia Serials department, released in June 1952, the plot line is based on a successful comic book that began in 1941, the Blackhawks were seven flyers who banded together during WW II to fight the Nazis, after the war, they continued to fight evil where ever they find it. Here they are battling a group of spies and saboteurs bent on destroying democracy ... the serial as directed by Spencer Gordon Bennet and Fred F. Sears, remains a fast paced action packed adventure, remains one of the best of the latter day serials.... and the lovely Carol Forman (my favorite serial villainous) in another of her ice cold no nonsense portrayals, but she does it in such an enticing way. ... the Columbia Studio serial machine turned out true masterpieces of action during the late 30s and early 40s ... remember this serial from the Saturday double features at our neighborhood theater ... 15 breathtaking chapters come across with all the gusto Columbia Studios has to offer.
Under Spencer Gordon Bennet (Director), Fred F. Sears (Director), Sam Katzman (Producer), Will Eisner (Characters of Comic Books), Royal K. Cole (Screenwriter), Sherman L. Lowe (Screenwriter), George H. Plympton (Screenwriter), William P. Whitley (Cinematographer), Earl Turner (Editor), Mischa Bakaleinikoff (Musical Director) ------ the cast includes Kirk Alyn (Blackhawk), Carol Forman (Laska), John Crawford (Chuck), Michael Fox (Mr. Case/The Leader), Don C. Harvey (Olaf), Rick Vallin (Stan/Boris), Larry Stewart (Andre), Weaver Levy (Chop Chop), Zon Murray (Bork), Nick Stuart (Cress), Marshall Reed (Aller), Pierce Lyden (Dyke), William Fawcett (Dr. J. Rolph), Rory Mallinson (Hodge), Frank Ellis (Hendrickson), Terry Frost (The Leader's Secretary), Jack Mulhall (Defense Council Member), Frank O'Connor (Defense Council Member), David Sharpe (Henchman/Mexican Motor Cop), Wally West (Henchman) ... great stunt work by the Columbia stunt personnel David Sharpe (stunt double: Rick Vallin & John Crawford), --- don't leave the theater until the final chapter ... another winner from the vaults of Columbia Serials --- this is a must watch for the serial buffs in all of us.
BIOS:
1 Kirk Alyn (aka: John Feggo Jr.)
Date of birth: 8 October 1910 - Oxford, New Jersey
Date of death: 14 March 1999 - The Woodlands, Texas,
Special footnote, Kirk Alyn was an American actor, best known for being the first actor
to play Superman on screen, in the 1948 film serial "Superman", and its 1950 sequel
"Atom Man Vs. Superman", starring in some similar comic book-type serials
"Daughter of Don Q" (1946), "Federal Agents Vs. Underworld Inc" (1948),
"Blackhawk" (1952) Alyn shared a very short cameo with his serial co-star, Noel Neill,
as the parents of the young Lois Lane in the 1978 feature film, "Superman: The Movie".
Kirk Alyn had been Grand Marshal of the Metropolis, Illinois Christmas parade and
Annual Superman Celebrations several times.
2. Carol Forman (aka: Carolyn Sawls)
Date of birth: 19 June 1918 - Epps, Alabama
Date of death: 9 July 1997 - Burbank, California
Special footnote, Raven-haired Carol Forman's main claim to fame is the fact that she was one
of the first villainesses in serials, Forman was not afraid to use her considerable attractiveness to
bamboozle the poor saps who tried to stop her nefarious plans for world domination, to steal
atomic secrets, or whatever she had up her sleeve, It was in 1947 that she essayed the role that
she is probably most famous for: "The Spider Woman" in Republic's "The Black Widow" (1947).
Forman made a big splash in that part and Republic immediately assigned her to other "bad girl" parts,
but she turned them down, not wanting to be pigeonholed in serials, she freelanced for a while,
doing a few westerns and a Columbia serial, then returned to Republic for her turn as the villain
Nila in 1949's "Federal Agents vs. Underworld, Inc". (1949).
3. Spencer Gordon Bennet (The Serial King) (Director)
Date of birth: 5 January 1893 - Brooklyn, New York, New York
Date of death: 8 October 1987 - Santa Monica, California
Special footnote, Spencer Gordon Bennet, was known as the "King of Serial Directors" he directed more film serials than anybody else, Bennet first entered show business as a stunt man, when he answered a newspaper ad to jump from the Palisades of the Hudson River while wearing a suit for the serial film Hurricane Hutch. The gig at that time paid $1 per foot he had to fall ... Bennet made his directorial debut in "Behold The Man" (1921), but made his serial directorial debut in with "Sunken Silver" (1925), Bennet would keep making serials, as well as B westerns features, until the very end of the genre, directing the very last two made in the United States, "Blazing the Overland Trail" (1956) and "Perils of the Wilderness" (1956). After the serials ended he directed a handful of features, his final directorial credit with "The Bounty Killer" (1965) with Dan Duryea, Bob Steele, Buster Crabbe, Johnny Mack Brown, Fuzzy Knight, I. Stanford Jolley Richard Arlen and Rod Cameron, which was also the final film to feature noted cowboy star Gilbert "Broncho Billy" Anderson ... when Bennet died in 1987, his tombstone was engraved "The Final Chapter" ... over his long career Bennet directed over a hundred serials including "Atom Man vs Superman" (1950) serial, "The Adventures of Sir Galahad" (1949), "Batman and Robin" (1949), "The Tiger Woman" (1944), "Captain Video" (1951), and numerous western serials. Among his western B-features were his long running "Red Ryder" series, featuring Don "Red" Barry, Wild Bill Elliott and Allan Rocky Lane during the '40s.
4. Fred F. Sears (Director/Actor)
Date of birth: 7 July 1913 - Boston, Massachusetts
Date of death: 30 November 1957 - Hollywood, California
If you're into vintage serials as I am, why not pick up a copy of the following titles from VCI Home Video:
VCI CLIFFHANGER TRAILERS:
1. Adventures of Red Ryder (Don "Red" Barry)
2. Adventures of the Flying Cadets (Bobby Jordan)
3. Buck Rogers (Buster Crabbe)
4. Captain Midnight (Dave O'Brien)
5. Captain Video: Master of the Stratosphere (Judd Holdren & I. Stanford Jolley)
6. Dick Tracy's G-Men (Ralph Byrd)
7. Don Winslow of the Navy (Don Terry)
8. Don Winslow of the Coast Guard (Don Terry)
9. Drums of Fu Manchu (Henry Brandon)
10.Fighting Kit Carson (Johnny Mack Brown)
11.Flash Gordon Conquers the Universe (Buster Crabbe)
12.The Green Archer (Victory Jory)
13.Jungle Girl (Frances Gifford)
14.Jungle Jim (Grant Withers & Raymond Hatton)
15.The Lost City (Kane Richmond, William Stage Boyd & George Gabby Hayes)
16.Lost City of the Jungle (Russell Hayden & Keye Luke)
17.Mandrake the Magician (Warren Hull & Dick Curtis)
18.Miracle Rider (Tom Mix & Tony Jr)
19.The Painted Stallion (Ray "Crash" Corrigan)
20.The Phantom (Tom Tyler)
21.The Return of Chandu (Bela Lugosi)
22.Riders of Death Valley (Dick Foran, Leo Carrillo & Buck Jones)
23.Secret Agent X-9 (1937) (Scott Kolk & Henry Brandon)
24.Secret Agent X-9 (1945) (Lloyd Bridges & Keye Luke)
25.Sky Raiders (Donald Woods & Billy Halop)
26.Undersea Kingdom (Ray "Crash" Corrigan)
27.Winners of the West (Dick Foran, Harry Woods, Roy Barcroft & Charles Stevens)
28.Zane Greys "King of the Royal Mounted" (Allan "Rocky" Lane)
29.Zorro's Cliffhanger Collection (Reed Hadley, John Carroll & Linda Stirling)
Hats off and thanks to Les Adams (collector/guideslines for character identification), Chuck Anderson (Webmaster: The Old Corral/B-Westerns.Com), Boyd Magers (Western Clippings), Bobby J. Copeland (author of "Trail Talk"), Rhonda Lemons (Empire Publishing Inc), Bob Nareau (author of "The Real Bob Steele") and Trevor Scott (Down Under) as they have rekindled my interest once again for B-Westerns and Serials --- looking forward to more high quality releases from the vintage serial era of the '20s, '30s & '40s and B-Westerns ... order your copy now from Amazon where there are plenty of copies available on VHS, stay tuned once again for top notch action mixed with deadly adventure --- if you enjoyed this title, why not check out VCI Entertainment where they are experts in releasing B-Westerns and Serials --- all my heroes have been cowboys!
Total Time: 263 mins on VHS ~ Sony Video ~ (5/30/1995)
Rating:  -
I grew up on Blackhawk comic books and I've wanted to see this serial for years. I went into it with low expectations after reading the negative comments on here, but what a pleasant surprise! This is great fun! I think Kirk is great and there's plenty of fun to be had. The depiction of Chop Chop in this version is far better that the racist depiction in the 1940's comics. This is good stuff. Perhaps not the best serial, but it is FUN!
Rating:  -
I wish the title were original, and it was, but Simone Signoret beat me into print with it.
I caught one episode of this when I was in my early teens and always wanted to see what I'd missed. Be careful what you wish for.
In the comics, the characters had comic-opera accents, but in this bomb, Olaf doesn't even have a Minnesota accent, much less Swedish, and none of the other "international" characters have one either. I know this was shot on a budget of a buck twenty-nine, but they cast a shrimp as Andre, then couldn't apparently spring for an eyebrow pencil to give him his trademark moustache. None of the blonds from the comic seemed to be blond, so they apparently couldn't spring for a couple of bottles of hydrogen peroxide, either.
The director of photography seemed to have cut his classes on lighting, the fights were apparently choreographed on the spot (I figure the Blackhawks won about 60% of the brawls, which hardly qualifies them for superhero stardom.) The effects were generally so cheesy they were funny.
The biggest problem was the writing. There were three writers and I got the feeling they only got together once to divvy up the job. The first writer probably said, "I can create something really inane with a six-pack and half a brain."
The second writer apparently said, "I can lose your plot (Where did the death-ray plot go? I dunno, it was here just a minute ago. Well, we'll skip on to an even more inane plot about Element X) and do something even more inane with six shots of tequila and half a prefrontal lobe."
Apparently the third writer said, "I can create a real mess with a quart of rotgut and the march of the dead brain cells."
I'm not going to recommend whether or not to buy this dog, but I will warn you that if you're getting it for nostalgia, keep your memories. If you want to see how bollixed-up the old serials were and like to laugh at the incompetent, this could be a great acquisition.
Rating:  -
As I saw Rick Vallin tonight Dec 30, 2003 in The Quick Gun with Audie Murphy, I remembered seeing Rick way back in the Blackhawk Serial over 50 years ago when I was 12.
Rating:  -
I saw the Blackhawk serial when it first came out about 50 years ago. The only disappointment I remember was that on screen we do not see all seven Blackhawks going around together and attacking the Commies and other enemies simultaneously, which they do in the comic books.
In the serial, only five of the Blackhawks are on active duty: Blackhawk himself (Kirk Alyn, Chuck (John Crawford), Olaf (Don Harvey, Andre (Larry Stewart) and Stan (short for Stanislaus; Rick Vallin). None of them has a foreign accent like in the comics.
Chop Chop is not the short, toothy, pigtailed comic relief that we see in the comics. He is dignified and soft-spoken, He stays behind at headquarters and operates the radio. Even 50 years ago I saw this as an improvement. He looks authentically Chinese, but the actor's name is Weaver Levy. Never figured that out.
And Hendrickson (Frank Ellis) stays behind to maintain the airplanes at the hangar. I wondered then, as I wonder now in middle age, how the Hendrickon with his middle-age spread and less than top physical condition was able to run around anyway.
With maturity, I see many of the holes in the plot and settings. For one thing, it is immediately obvious today that Blackhawk Headquarters has no security. The bad guys can just drive up to it, somewhere in Arizona supposedly but maybe in the San Fernando Valley. Maybe we didn't notice these things back in the 1950s?
It is still gripping and enjoyable today, although maybe less so than before. I assumed when I first saw it that The Leader was Josef Stalin, dictator of the USSR. In the 15th chapter we found out the truth. When I saw it again recently, I of course already knew the ending. So like in other cases like this, the thing to do is look for hints as to how you can first guess what is going to happen.
All in all, this is worth it if you are/were a serial fan. And oneof the handful of Columbia serials actually available through regular commercial outlets.
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