The Pirates of Penzance

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Wilford Leach directs. Douglas Slocombe behind the camera. Anne V. Coates cuts. Produced in United Kingdom, United States of America. Dialogue in English.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

• 143 years old — old enough to be someone's favourite childhood film.
• 2International production across 2 countries: United Kingdom, United States of America.
• 3Directed by Wilford Leach, shot by Douglas Slocombe. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
• 4Editor Anne V. Coates shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
• 5Kevin Kline and Angela Lansbury and Linda Ronstadt carry the top of the cast.
• 6IMDB entry: tt0086112 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
• 7Only 53 TMDB ratings — you're getting ahead of the curve on this one.

The technical file

Cinematography

Douglas Slocombe

Editing

Anne V. Coates

Production design

Elliot Scott

Runtime

112 min · 1h 52m

Aspect ratio (typical)

1.37:1 (Academy)

Status

Released

Box office

$694,497

Original language

EN

Certification (US)

G

IMDB

The Pirates of Penzance (1983) ↗

Rotten Tomatoes

80% 🍅 Fresh

Metacritic

66/100

IMDB rating

7.1/10 · 4,021 votes

MPAA

G

Also by

Wilford Leach

• 
  All's Well That Ends Well

  1978 · ★ 7.0
• 
  Coriolanus

  1979 · ★ 5.0
• 
  The Wedding Party

  1969 · ★ 4.3

Stills · wallpapers

Selected frames

Full-resolution frames — open one to save it as a wallpaper.

Wallpaper Wallpaper

Trailers & featurettes

Watch the pieces

• 

  ▶
  The Pirates of Penzance (1983) Official Trailer - Kevin Kline, Angela Lansbury Musical HD

  Trailer

Community reviews

What people are saying

• CinemaSerf2023-06-08
  ★ 6/10

  We start off as a band of pirates approach the town, and the citizens all rush to seek shelter in buildings that are clearly made of canvas and greasepaint... I found that to be quite an useful introduction to this film version of Gilbert and Sullivan's 1870s operetta; it made it clear that this was going to be a stage version on film, rather than any attempt to recreate the story for the cinema. Expectations suitably set - it goes off on a pretty enjoyable romp through this (mixed with one or two other of their works) story of the young "Frederic" (Rex Smith) who has been doing a sort of youth opportunities scheme with a band of ruthless pirates led by Kevin Kline. To stave off this imminent destruction, and the capture of his daughters - the "Maj. General" (George Rose) appeals to their sense of pity by declaring that he is an orphan, and that they wouldn't want to leave an old man lonely and bereft in his latter years. Their evil hearts melt, and his daughters (and the town) are spared. "Frederic" has an encounter on the beach with the beautiful "Mabel" (Linda Ronstadt) - one of the daughters of the old solider and they both fall head over heels in love and all looks set fair. Snag? Well the poor soul was born on the last day of February in a leap year, and has had actually only had five (not twenty one) birthdays - so the terms of his indenture mean he must serve another 60-odd years with the pirates! Luckily for him, "Mabel" agrees to wait for him and what ensues now are a series of gently comedic escapades as their love story develops, and the "Maj. General" and "Pirate King" come to a perilous reckoning before the very timely intervention of Queen Victoria. Accomplished theatre actress Angela Lansbury features, importantly but sparingly, as the deaf old nurse "Ruth" and Tony Azito is quite entertaining as the "sergeant" too. G&S purists might not appreciate the slightly hybrid nature of this effort, but I rather enjoyed the wobbly sets, the scenery clearly made of polystyrene and papier-mâché and the tightly shot photography - it is offering us a variety of theatre seats to watch it from, but we are never in doubt that this is essentially still a stage production. Kline and Smith are on fine form, the latter really takes the part by the scruff of the neck and even though his voice is not quite what it might be, he gives it everything he can and his enjoyment, his daft love scenes and songs with the Golden Globe nominated Ronstadt, along with a soupçon of swash and buckle and plenty of camp humour all keep the momentum moving along nicely. The song of the film is "Model of a Modern Major General" but the patter song works really well too. As cinematic adaptations go, Wilford Leach has allowed the cast to thrive with the colourful, nonsense elements of this story and we are presented with something as akin to that which we might see on stage as possible - and it's good.

  Read full review ↓

Production companies

Who made it

• 

  Universal Pictures

  US

Key crew

• Music EditorChris Kelly
• EditorAnne V. Coates
• ProducerJoseph Papp
• Executive ProducerEdward R. Pressman
• SongsArthur Sullivan
• Production DesignElliot Scott
• Art DesignerDrew Struzan
• LyricistWilliam S. Gilbert
• SongsWilliam S. Gilbert
• Special Effects SupervisorBrian Johnson

Themes & keywords

What it's about, really

• cornwall, england
• victorian england
• pirate
• based on opera
• 19th century
• inspirational
• comic opera

Release history · US

When it landed

• Theatrical1983-02-18G

Also known as

International titles

• Pirates of PenzanceUS
• PiratesUS
• The Slave of DutyGB