Errol Flynn is Don Juan and he leads you through the story. Something to do with kings and queens and Spain and England. It doesn't matter.It's about swordplay and romance and Flynn is a master at demonstrating this with his likeable humour.The film doesn't have any significance outside of the time you spend watching it but Flynn entertains you for the duration.

You could look at it cynically and view Adventures of Don Juan as a career life support, seeing Errol Flynn going to back to doing what made him famous in the first place after a string of unsuccessful pictures at the box office but it is none the less Errol Flynn returning to do what he does best. Despite not having done a swashbuckler since The Sea Hawk in 1940, Adventures of Don Juan manages to recapture the magic of his earlier days in this very dialogue driven swashbuckler. Flynn's signs of ageing are increasingly apparent but considering his health and status as a star this would have been the final time Flynn could have headlined a big budget production such as this.The Technicolor here doesn't have the striking vibrancy of The Adventures of Robin Hood but the beautiful, detailed backdrops and very large scale sets with immaculate attention to detail are superb. The only complaint I have production wise is the very obvious use of footage taken from The Adventures of Robin Hood which sticks out from the rest of a movie which was filmed a decade later. It's a shame they couldn't get Michael Curtiz to direct for one last Flynn adventure or Erich Wolfgang Korngold to do the music score, none the less Max Steiner's score does the job. I also previously knew Viveca Lindfors as the teacher from the 1985 comedy The Sure Thing. To see her 37 years earlier play a Spanish queen in the 17th century was such a contrasting role.Unlike John Barrymore's take on Don Juan in 1926, Flynn's Don Juan uses the character's insatiable lust for woman for laughs rather than for tragedy (I doubt a film in tone of the Barrymore Don Juan could be made during the code era). Flynn's Don Juan is a charmer but with a tad buffoonery to him, who's love making antics threaten relations between England and Spain. However Flynn injects some John Barrymore into his performance with his manner of speaking, which it should then come as no surprise that Flynn would later portray Barrymore in Too Much, Too Soon. What is also taken over from the Barrymore Don Juan is the famous breathtaking epic dive down the stairs; and it does not disappoint. The two villains in Adventures of Don Juan, the King of Spain (Romney Brent) and the Duke de Lorca (Robert Douglas) attempt to hatch a plan to build an armada in secret for world conquest and use shady tactics along the way such as abducting subjects by force for the navy. This was only a few years after the Second World War had ended and the memories of Hitler where still vivid in people's minds. Robert Douglas channels a bit of Basil Rathbone in his performance while the partnership between these two villains is the classic Emperor/Darth Vader set up; with one figure taking the public limelight and the other pulling the strings behind the scenes; as the Duke de Lorca puts it, "I have no desire to sit on a throne, I much prefer to stand behind it".

Like his swashbuckling predecessor Douglas Fairbanks, Errol Flynn tackled the part of Don Juan in his late years, he was 39 when he made this film for Warner Brothers. Like Fairbanks, Flynn plays an older and wiser famous lover who's getting a bit bored by it all. Not unlike the real life Errol Flynn.The Adventures Of Don Juan finds Tirso De Molina's famous lover sent home after a couple of escapades in the newly formed Kingdom of Great Britain. King Philip III and Queen Margaret give our hero a chance to redeem himself by teaching at the royal fencing academy.He's up to his neck in trouble soon enough, but not the kind of trouble Flynn's usually in. The first minister Robert Douglas is planning a move against the Queen who he sees as his main obstacle for total power in the kingdom. And the great lover starts behaving more like Sir Lancelot and less like Don Juan where Queen Margaret as played by Viveca Lindfors is concerned.Although Philip III was not the great ruler his father Philip II was, by no means was he as big a fool as Romney Brent plays him. The real Queen Margaret who was his Hapsburg cousin did in fact have considerable influence over domestic and foreign policy in Spain.The Adventures of Don Juan was given a sumptuous production and won an Oscar for Costume Design and was nominated for Art&Set Design. I think the film's best asset besides Errol Flynn is Max Steiner's music. As Flynn films usually are well scored, this one even stands out among that group.The Adventures of Don Juan marked the thirteenth and last film that Alan Hale made with Errol Flynn. If Alan Hale or Frank McHugh did not appear in Warner Brothers production it didn't seem quite right. Jack Warner kept those two guys busiest of all at his studio.Although Errol was getting older and his hedonistic living was starting to show, the part calling for an older and wiser Don Juan was well suited for him. One wishes he'd done the role back in the middle Thirties as a young man however.

This was Flynn's last big one. He was only 38 at the time but had begun drinking in the afternoon, causing problems on the set, what with multiple retakes and a major binge that lasted several weeks. It's not "The Sea Hawk" or "Robin Hood." Still, the film was artfully edited and clearly a lot of money was spent on it. The Technicolor photography is outstanding and nobody ever looked quite so natural in a gaudy period outfit as Flynn. It holds one's interest.The story has Flynn as Don Juan, lover and swordsman, returning to Spain at the beginning of the 1600s. It's really a pastiche, kind of like "The Sea Hawk" with elements introduced from various other films of the genre. There's the well-intentioned Queen, the beautiful Viveca Lindfors of the plump lips and strong features, surrounded by weaklings and traitors who want to go to war -- except for Don Juan, of course. (Cf., "The Sea Hawk.") There's the comic sidekick, Alan Hale. (Cf., all of Flynn's Warners pictures.) The good guys disguised as hooded monks. ("Robin Hood", "The Mark of Zorro.") The hero and villain, face to face and belly to belly, straining at their crossed swords, and the villain sneakily withdrawing a dagger from his belt ("Robin Hood"). The hero captured and thrown into prison to await execution, only to make a spectacular escape. ("Robin Hood", "The Mark of Zorro.") Shadows fighting on the castle wall. ("Robin Hood," "The Prisoner of Zenda".) And so on. Some shot are edited in that are taken directly from "Robin Hood" and "Elizabeth and Essex." Robert Douglas is Duke de Lorca, the heavy. He makes a slimier heavy than Basil Rathbone did. Douglas is okay but Rathbone was a nonpareil with his tall figure, abrupt movements, and darting glances. Perc Westmore was responsible for the make-up. He should be proud of himself for the task with which Flynn must have presented him. But he should be ashamed of himself for what he did to the villains. You know how you can tell the principal villains from everyone else? They all have dark eye shadow, so they look like the ghouls or zombies in a Grade C horror flick. Douglas has this sinister curl down the middle of his forehead that looks painted on.The director, Vincent Sherman, doesn't seem to have compelled any of the performers to act with any subtlety. It's not that kind of movie. But everyone is professionally competent. Alan Hale -- well, it's as if he were your fond uncle. Viveca Lindfors probably puts the most effort into her work. When Flynn enters her life she becomes positively, and literally, breathless. And watch the fleeting expressions that cross her features when Flynn confesses his love for her -- the briefest of half-hopeful smiles followed by a scowl of indignation.The amours of Don Juan occasion some amusing moments. One of the many young ladies who come to watch him instruct the members of the fencing academy leaves her fan behind. When Flynn calls this to her attention, she replies, "You WILL return it, won't you? It's the house on the Plaza Madrid. The last house on the right." "Oh, on the RIGHT," says a resigned Flynn, who has heard this hundreds of times before.The budgets on Flynn's pictures dropped dramatically after "The Adventures of Don Juan." He chain smoked, used drugs, boozed it up daily, and never complained. He died at the age of 50, having lived as he pleased.