Electro shock therapy can do wonders. Coming out of it, you can be introduced to the Errol Flynn version and you can live a worthwhile life and most of those nightmares will disappear.
I watched the clip. Fred Astaire he ain’t. But he’s damn better than I am.
But then, all I can do is the Golden Slave in Sheherazade and a host of other ballet leads. 
Fact is, I got this ballet DVD from amazon: The Kirov Celebrates Nijinsky. It includes Sheherazade, Le Spectre de la Rose, Polovtsian Dances and Firebird.
For my money (and I know squat about ballet), Sheherazade is the best of the lot. This gal, Svetlana Zakharova dances the lead and she’s hotter than a ho in heat. I swear.
Married to the Shah, Sheher-baby is having an affair with Golden Slave, who, by the way, is very believeable as Sheherazade’s extramarital lover.
The entire number is fantastic, and worth the price of the DVD.
He’s technically proficient, no doubt. But the rod-up-the-ass-all-the-way-to-his-neck style of dancing makes it just impossible for me to watch. He’s just so horribly, horribly stiff. When Savion Glover dances–or Danny Kaye or Bill Robinson or Fred Astaire or whoever else–their shoulders are looser and more dynamic, and are directly above their pelvis. Cagney dances like he’s being tossed out of a bar by an invisible bouncer who has him by the belt.
The Adventures of Robin Hood is one of my all-time favorite movies. It’s a great adventure, and I love how earnest and fun it is. And I’ll watch Errol Flynn in tights any day.
Barn Owl, you should also check out Captain Blood, a fantastic swashbuckler featuring Errol Flynn and pirates. It just came out on DVD and it rawks.
We just saw it as a family last month. My 7 year old son loves Pirates, and I wanted him to see the most classic of Pirates Movies.
Not as good as Robin Hood, but damn good and you even get Basil Rathbone & Olivia de Havilland again.
Now that you’ve seen The Adventures of Robin Hood, watch Robin and Marian.
True, but a much better Robin Hood movie was made that same year, with Patrick Bergin and Uma Thurman.
But this impression is almost exclusively based on his performance as Cohan, who Cagney was attempting to emulate in his dancing style. All you have to do is watch the “Shanghai Lil” number from Footlight Parade to see that Cagney can be loose and limber and, in his sailor suit, wouldn’t look at all out of place next to Gene Kelly in On the Town. It’s still a bit of an acquired taste (it does evoke a marionette at times), but I’d take it any day over Kaye’s artless tomfoolery (he may hit his marks, but I never thought him much of a dancer).
Absolutely right.
He had his shitty little 2-steps that he used all the time. And this isn’t sour grapes.
When I was a kid, I adored Danny Kaye. At various Boys Club activities, I’d bring down the house with Tchaikovsky, Dinah (pronounced Deena) and Minnie the Moocher.
But Danny was no dancer (although I didn’t know it at the time).
The appropriate follow up to The Adventures of Robin Hood is the BBC series *Robin of Sherwood. * (NOT the current series!) Very mystical and earthy, with a great soundtrack by Clannad. Then watch Robin and Marian.
D’ehhh,
don’t you worry
never fear
Robin Hood will soon be here.*
Not Carey Elwes? 
PRINCE JOHN: Why should the people listen to you?
ROBIN HOOD: Because, unlike some Robin Hoods, I can speak with an English accent!
Could Cohan’s style have been truer to the traditions of Irish step dancing? That style is one of the roots of American tap. Although many Irish dancers don’t exactly dance like Michael Flatley.
Of course, the other side of Tap came from Africa. Thus, the backbone that can bend!
Of course, to my generation Robin Hood will always be Dick Gautier.
"Robin Hood, Robin Hood, riding through the glen.
Robin, Hood, Robin Hood, with his band of men.
Feared by the Bad
Loved by the Good
Robin Hood, Robin Hood, Robin Hood!
But I got to see the Errol Flynn version while still quite young. Yesterday, it was on TCM while the “new” Robin Hood ran on BBCAMERICA.
What about Daffy Duck with his “buck and a quarter staff”?
“Hah! Hah! Thrust! Parry!”
I had to look that up. I could not understand how Hymie could be Robin Hood to you. Regretfully, I never saw “When things were Rotten.”
Jim
[QUOTE=Bridget Burke]
Could Cohan’s style have been truer to the traditions of Irish step dancing? That style is one of the roots of American tap. Although many Irish dancers don’t exactly dance like Michael Flatley.
This never occurred to me. Thank you, Bridget Burke. So, maybe Cagney isn’t so bad, after all.
Nobody’s mentioned my favorite piece of trivia about this movie yet! Maid Marian’s horse, a lovely palomino, is better known as Roy Rogers’ horse Trigger.
Yoiks! and AWAY!!!