Excellent but underrated film

Boring, over-political, tech fuzed mess

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

A beautiful movie, simple story that was well written and directed , of course it will not won an oscar , but after 39 years from it produced and with those old special effects back then, I guarante to all , you will not regret, you will enjoy as I really enjoyed watching it with my kids, it's simple ,charm, magic and funny, that the kind of movies we are missing in these days, it's really worth your time .

The film though done with a limited budget is a classic and the last of a kind we do not see anymore as I will explain. Before the 1970s Arabs and other nations of the Middle East were represented in an exotic and romantic manner with a curious interest of the areas culture in terms of the literature of the Arabian Nights classics and European accounts of the Classical Arab Empire. The film is well produced with a good cast especially Christopher Lee, Emma Samms and Oliver Tobias who can pass as Arabs and do a good representation and acting along with the rest of the costume and background setting of the film with protocol and respect. The story is interesting and takes its inspiration from the original stories that fascinated Europe with Arabic literature on its themes of adventure, mysticism and imaginative content looking for a rose along with good chemistry with the differing characters protagonist and antagonist. The film is not politically incorrect or prejudice rather it a fair and positive representation of Arabs and Muslims at their classical zenith that is entertaining and interesting. The minor faults i find with the film is the characters are slightly clichéd and in some parts it is cheesy that only targets a particular audience rather then a broad one. With the negative stereotyping of all things Middle Eastern in today's Films and Media this film deserves more credit and attention then is given.

Prince Oliver Tobias will be granted permission to marry Princess Emma Samms if he succeeds in a quest to find a magic flower for her father, wicked Caliph Christopher Lee. However, the wicked Caliph has contrived to send along duplicitous Milo O'Shea to make sure the quest fails.This fantasy adventure features special effects which weren't all that special back at the time (back projected backgrounds behind flying carpets with wiggly edges, and models which scream "I am a model!" chief among them), some dodgy fighting, some screamingly though unintentionally funny dialogue, not massively heroic performances from Tobias and Samms, Mickey Rooney overacting as if his life depends on it, and beautifully understated villainy from Christopher Lee.For all that, there is a naïve enthusiasm about it which pleases and, at the time, we had nothing better. But these days we are used to our fantasy being a little less unsophisticated.

This was a really nice rediscovery on UK DVD for me; I remember I've watched 'Arabian Adventure' on TV in the 1980s but not since then. I mean, you get flying carpets, jinns, belly-dancers, a beautiful princess to save and Christopher Lee as an evil wizard turning people into toads ("You call yourself my servant?") - what more could you ask for? 'Arabian Adventure' knows the genre standards and delivers. Lest I forget, fire-breathing metal monsters and Peter Cushing with a silly beard are in it as well. One has to admit that the limited budget shows in the set decoration, as the palace looks more like cardboard than marble, and then some effects like the superimposed jinn are rather TV quality than big screen. But fairy tales from 1001 Nights don't need realism that much, I found I could successfully switch into fantasy mode and simply enjoy it. It's an old-fashioned production like they did in the 1940s and 50s, maintaining the same naive charm and that's fine for such kind of things.