Blood & Sand (1941)

He is no more than a passing fancy to Dona Sol, who has a thing for handsome matadors, and then discards them like last week's trash when she tires of them. And the crowds who gather at the ring are no less fickle. Only Carmen and his mother love him unconditionally, but he does not see that until it is too late.

Anthony Quinn is absorbing as Manola de Palma, Juan's friend, who gravitates to Dona Sol and becomes her latest boy toy, as well as the new star of the bullring. Laird Cregar, an underrated character actor with a short career, is his very reliable self as critic Natalio Curro, who pronounces Hayworth's temptress as "death in the evening". (And she is).

Other reviewers have commented on how many of the actors in this project met tragic and premature ends. It is alarming, not only the three leads, but Cregar, George Reeves (as Hayworth's rejected suitor, Pierre) and Victor Kilian, as the priest, who was murdered while strolling past Grauman's Chinese Theatre.

Too bad that Carmen and Dona Sol only meet once in the film, but it is entertaining to see the loyal wife and unscrupulous seductress in the same frame, and both Darnell and Hayworth were classic beauties, as well as underrated as performing artists.

One minor quibble - 20th Century Fox picked the wrong singer to dub Hayworth's vocals! "Verde luna" is a lovely song, but the uncredited Gracilla Pirraga was completely unsuited to provide a singing voice for Rita, expert lip-syncher that she was. If there ever was a way to tell if her voice was dubbed, that moment would be it! There is a waiting list at amazon for the DVD of this movie when it becomes available. A VHS copy is a good substitute for now, but DVD format (and hopefully, extras) will definitely enhance the viewing experience.

It's worth seeing for the cinematography and stars alone!


Temptation And Tragedy In The Bullring . . . .   April 9, 2006
 0 out of 1 found this review helpful

Rouben Mamoulian's remake of the silent classic that made a star of Rudolph Valentino is a visual treat. The techincolor is rich, with all the shades of color (especially the blues and reds)glorious. And the stars don't look too shabby either! Tyrone Power makes a gorgeous Juan Gallardo, the poor boy who rises to fame in the bullring, but who is unable to resist the shallow and deadly beautiful noblewoman Dona Sol (Rita Hayworth, on loan from Columbia, about to be catapulted to stardom), despite his gentle, loving wife, Carmen (Linda Darnell, in her fourth and last teaming with power).

He is no more than a passing fancy to Dona Sol, who has a thing for handsome matadors, and then discards them like last week's trash when she tires of them. And the crowds who gather at the ring are no less fickle. Only Carmen and his mother love him unconditionally, but he does not see that until it is too late.

Anthony Quinn is absorbing as Manola de Palma, Juan's friend, who gravitates to Dona Sol and becomes her latest boy toy, as well as the new star of the bullring. Laird Cregar, an underrated character actor with a short career, is his very reliable self as critic Natalio Curro, who pronounces Hayworth's temptress as "death in the evening". (And she is).

Other reviewers have commented on how many of the actors in this projects met tragic and premature ends. It is alarming, not only the three leads, but Cregar, George Reeves (as Hayworth's rejected suitor, Pierre) and Victor Kilian, as the priest, who was murdered while strolling past Grauman's Chinese Theatre.

Too bad that Carmen and Dona Sol only meet once in the film, but it is entertaining to see the loyal wife and unscrupulous seductress in the same frame, and both Darnell and Hayworth were classic beauties, as well as underrated as performing artists.

One minor quibble - 20th Century Fox picked the wrong singer to dub Hayworth's vocals! "Verde luna" is a lovely song, but the uncredited Gracilla Pirraga was completely unsuited to provide a singing voice for Rita, expert lip-syncher that she was. If there ever was a way to tell if her voice was dubbed, that moment would be it! There is a waiting list at amazon for the DVD of this movie when it becomes available. A VHS copy is a good substitute for now, but DVD format (and hopefully, extras) will definitely enhance the viewing experience.

It's worth seeing for the cinematography and stars alone!


Certainly not a masterpiece.   May 15, 2004
 0 out of 1 found this review helpful

I'm not a Tyrone Power fan but I don't denigrate him either.
It is just that Blood & Sand is one of his lesser movies. For one thing he is just to damn pretty. The techicolor is marvelous & gets a star.
There are several actual bull-fighting scenes in the movie. When they go into the studio to do Power's close up it is obviously fake. the whole effect is rather cheesy.
The good news is that this is the break-out film for Rita Hayworth. Linda Darnell is beautiful as she always is. It was fun to see a young Anthony Quinn in a supporting role


One of Tyrone Power's best --- needs to be on DVD   February 12, 2004
 1 out of 2 found this review helpful

This 1941 masterpiece, a remake of the 1922 Valentino classic, starring the legendary Tyrone Power in the Valentino role, with Linda Darnell and, in one of her first big roles, Rita Hayworth. The Technicolor cinematography of this masterpiece is absolutely stunning, the colors practically leap off the screen. You can't get that look in modern movies anymore; all movies today are too bright or too dull.

Anyway, its time for Fox to release this title on DVD, along with The Black Swan, Captain from Castile and others. Tyrone Power is a trully excellent and underrated actor, and his movies must be released on DVD.


Death In The Afternoon   December 24, 2003
"Blood and Sand" based on the novel by Ibanez and presented by 20th Century-Fox is a masterpiece of old style Hollywood filmmaking. Director Rouben Mamoulian pulls out all the stops to present this Technicolor flushed romantic story of Juan Gallardo who is portrayed by the impossibly beautiful Tyrone Power. Juan grows from a poor boy dreaming of glory in the bullrings of Spain to the epitome of arrogance and ignorant of the cost to his soul of his fame.
The three principals of the story are, Tyrone Power, Linda Darnell as his childhood sweetheart Carmen, and Rita Hayworth as the seductive and hollow Dona Sol.
Tyrone Power presents us with a marvelous, energetic portrait of a young, brash and over confident Juan. His first close-up bursts the edges of the screen and burns in the colors of Goya. Tyrone Power was made for the movies and cinematographers Ernest Palmer and Ray Rennahan film him with as much care as they do the two female leads. Thus this overpoweringly beautiful close-up sucks the viewer into the world of Juan and one is swept away by his charm and bravado. Mr. Powers's performance is almost overshadowed at first by his physical presence but as the story progresses his talent as a film actor takes over and sustains the viewer to the end.
Linda Darnell, a great beauty of the movies and by her own admission, not much of an actress, turns in a very good performance as Juan's discarded wife Carmen. I do not agree with Miss Darnell's opinion of her talents. One only has to look at "Letter to Three Wives" to see what an accomplished screen actress she was. And here too she takes the thankless role of Carmen and makes one care about the poor girl.
Then we have Rita Hayworth who here in "Blood and Sand" sets the standard for the great-lost beauties of the silver screen. Her Dona Sol is everything we hope for in the empty shell of a femme fatale.
It is said of her, at one point in the film by a newspaper critic of bullfighting, as he points to the ring: "Gentleman, if this is death in the afternoon, then she is death in the evening." And Miss Hayworth lives up to every inch of his description in this her breakout performance.
In the garden scene where she performs the "Toro!" seduction and sings to her victim Juan, she is utterly captivating and irresistible in her Travis Banton gown and cascading titian hair. Here we see the birth of Rita Hayworth and the demise of Rita Cansino.
Also worth mentioning are Anthony Quinn as one of Juan's boyhood friends, Manola De Palma and the wonderful silent star Alla Nazemova who is heart breaking as Juan's mother.
The music by the masterful Alfred Newman sets the tone and emotion of the film. Lush and full of the sounds of Spain it is one of his best.
Darryl Zanuck believed that story was everything in film. Without a good story you had nothing to build a film on. In "Blood and Sand" the head of Fox proves his point and gives us a great movie presented in the grand style of Hollywood's golden age.