Taras Bulba

John Chard

August 7, 2015

7/10

Faith and a good Sabre arm. Taras Bulba is directed by J. Lee Thompson and adapted to the screen by Waldo Salt and Karl Tunberg from a story by Nikolai Gogol. It stars Yul Brynner, Tony Curtis, Christine Kaufmann and Perry Lopez. Out of United Artists, it's a DeLuxe/Eastman Color/Panavision production, with the music scored by Franz Waxman and cinematography by Joseph MacDonald. Loosely based on Gogol's short novel, story tells of a Cossack uprising against the Polish forces who have taken…

Wuchak

March 26, 2022

6/10

_**Cossacks vs. Poles on the steppes of Ukraine (actually Argentina)**_ In the 16th century, Cossacks on the Ukrainian steppe defy their subjugators, the Poles. Yul Brynner plays a hearty colonel while Tony Curtis plays his eldest son, who foolishly falls for a lovely princess in Kiev (Christine Kaufmann). "Taras Bulba" (1962) is based on the first half of the classic novella by Nikolai Gogol, published in 1835. At heart, it’s a sword & sandal flick that meshes “The Vikings” (1958) with …

CinemaSerf

November 19, 2024

6/10

This tale of the 16th century Cossack uprising against the Poles who had betrayed them years before is kicked off by a memorable, rousing theme from Franz Waxman. Unfortunately, it's largely downhill from here. Yul Brynner never looks comfortable in the title role. He has decided to fight the Poles on his own terms by sending his two sons to university in Kiev to learn their ways. His son "Andrei" (Tony Curtis) falls in love with the beautiful but rather coy Governor's daughter "Natalia" (Christ…