
Douglas Fairbanks' most beautiful film — shot in the early two-color Technicolor process that gives every frame the lush, painterly quality of a Howard Pyle illustration come to life. A nobleman, sole survivor of a pirate attack, infiltrates the buccaneers by pretending to be one of them, rising through their ranks while secretly plotting their destruction. Fairbanks, characteristically, performed his own stunts — including a famous sequence where he rides a sail down a ship's mast using a knife as a brake — and his physical grace against the jewel-toned Technicolor backgrounds creates some of the most gorgeous imagery in all of silent cinema. The film was the first feature to use the color process throughout, and its success proved that color wasn't just a novelty but a genuine artistic tool. Pure swashbuckling rapture.
Douglas Fairbanks' most beautiful film — shot in the early two-color Technicolor process that gives every frame the lush, painterly quality of a Howard Pyle illustration come to life. A nobleman, sole survivor of a pirate attack, infiltrates the buccaneers by pretending to be one of them, rising through their ranks while secretly plotting their destruction. Fairbanks, characteristically, performed his own stunts — including a famous sequence where he rides a sail down a ship's mast using a knife as a brake — and his physical grace against the jewel-toned Technicolor backgrounds creates some of the most gorgeous imagery in all of silent cinema. The film was the first feature to use the color process throughout, and its success proved that color wasn't just a novelty but a genuine artistic tool. Pure swashbuckling rapture.

Douglas Fairbanks
The Duke of Arnoldo / The Black Pirate

Billie Dove
Princess Isobel

Anders Randolf
Pirate Captain

Donald Crisp
MacTavish

Tempe Pigott
Duenna (as Tempe Pigett)

Sam De Grasse
Pirate Lieutenant

Charles Stevens
Powder Man
John Wallace
Peg-Leg Pirate
Fred Becker
Pirate

Charles Belcher
Chief Passenger - Nobleman

E.J. Ratcliffe
The Governor
Nino Cochise
Pirate (uncredited)

Barry Norton
Youth (uncredited)

Mary Pickford
Princess Isobel in Final Embrace - Cameo Appearance (uncredited)