Better Late Then Never

It's not great by any means, but it's a pretty good movie that didn't leave me filled with regret for investing time in it.

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.

The Thief of Bagdad is a 1940 British fantasy film classic remake of a 1924 classic of the same name. The movie is magical, each scene is inviting and you will love the whole effects used (that is if you are viewing it from the eye of someone from the 40s). Here is where the whole blue screen effect started, and if you are like me who watched Disney's Aladdin and liked it, you will love to see where Disney got their idea from.It won't be fair if anyone goes on listing fantasy films and skip this classic, this was one movie that I remembered watching when I was young when my lovable aunt introduced me to the love of movies, this movie made me wish I too had a flying carpet. Sabu, who played Abu in this movie, did not put up much of a classic acting that many say made him famous, but he was not that bad either to me the actor that stole the show was Conrad Veidt who played Jaffar.The movie plot is about a Prince named Ahmed (John Justin) who got fooled by his most trusted advisory Jaffar to leaving the palace and seeing life how life is on the street first hand. While there Jaffar had Ahmed arrested as a mad man and planned to kill him, while he Jaffar mounted the throne.But in prison Ahmed met a resourceful thief named Abu and together they broke out of jail.On their getaway, Ahmed got to meet and fall in love with a beautiful princess that Jaffar had eyes for and so Jaffar did all that he could to get Ahmed out of the way, and Ahmed with the help of Abu did all that they could to save the princess, which include meeting a Genie, getting a magic carpet and a crystal that can show you anything you want.This British classic made use of the best of the best in effects in the 40s it won the Academy Awards for Cinematography, Art Direction and Special Effects. The Thief of Bagdad marks the first major use of bluescreening in the film industry, all due to Larry Butler who introduced and pioneered it.This movie has greatly influenced many other movies after it's time especially those released about The Book of One Thousand and One Nights tales, let's not forget Disney's Aladdin and its franchise and The Prince of Persia video game franchise. The movie stands strong on a 100% approval rating on the critic aggregate site Rotten Tomatoes, and it was a critical and commercial success. So if you have not seen this wonderful tale that happened down in Bagdad, about how a Prince and a thief took on the evil sorcerer Jaffar so as to save the beautiful Princess; then where have you been? Take the time out to go see this movie you will be glad you did.www.lagsreviews.com

After reading love letter after love letter to this film from just about every critic, as well as filmmakers like Scorsese and Coppola, I feel a bit churlish and Scrooge- like doing anything other than embracing it without reservation. I certainly enjoyed and appreciated this great looking early Technicolor spectacle, It's fun, sweet, always entertaining, but the effects, while impressive for their day are distractingly dated, and the character development is sketchy at best. The two romantic leads in particular are pretty shallow, and seem to fall instantly in love for no other reason than the story tells them to, On the other hand both Conrad Veight as the sometimes over the top, but enjoyably hateful villain, and Sabu as the lovable lad who helps a king regain his kingdom fare much better. There are sequences I did find flat out wonderful (the whole very famous interaction between Sabu and the genie he finds and frees holds up to all the clips I've seen over the years), And given current politics, seeing Islam treated as benign and poetic is certainly refreshing. Maybe I was over prepared, or expecting too much. I didn't fully 'get' the greatness of 'Citizen Kane' the first time I saw it either, because I was so over-hyped. In any case, it was enough fun that I won't regret giving it another look, and seeing if it grows on me even more with a second viewing.

The story about how this film came to be made is almost as interesting as the film itself. Thief of Baghdad was a break-through film in many ways. British director Alex Korda put everything on the line for this film. Technicolor was new, and no one knew what could be done with color including the inventors of Technicolor. Korda placed his future in the hands of a young man who had dropped out of Burbank High School, Larry Butler. Butler was a budding genius who went on to make many important films over the next 30 years. He went to work with Korda after working in his father's special effects shop in Los Angeles, one of the first special effects workshops in Hollywood.For the Thief of Baghdad, he developed the "traveling matte" and the "blue screen." The effects first appeared in this film and have become ubiquitous in films ever since. Every special effects film since this one has made use of the visual techniques developed by Larry Butler. Butler won the Oscar for this 1940 film, and he was nominated again and again for his many achievements in special effects. Korda's bet on Butler paid off, as this film is generally considered to be a landmark in the history of film-making.

This is simply one of my favorite fantasy films of all time. Not many movies are so magical, so charming and so imaginative as this. I can clearly see the influence of this movie in many movies that came later, but not many of them were as good as this one. "The Thief of Bagdad" had everything that you could want from a fantasy films: An exciting, unpredictable story, charming and likable characters, and an incredible, beautiful atmosphere and incredible visuals (That still look pretty good)I wish there were more movies like this. I would give this movie eleven stars if I could. I highly recommend it to anyone!