Ivanhoe (1982)

The best version is the 1982 TV movie starring Anthony Andrews (“A.D.”) as Ivanhoe, Olivia Hussey and James Mason (“Jesus of Nazareth”’s Virgin Mary and Joseph of Arimathea) as the Jewess Rebecca and her father Isaac of York, and Sam Neill (Jurassic Park), John Rhys-Davies (The Lord of the Rings), and Stuart Wilson (The Mask of Zorro) as villainous Norman knights.

Adapted by John Gay and directed Douglas Camfield, this retelling takes its boldest narrative risk at the outset, omitting entirely the tense supper scene at Cedric the Saxon’s hold and skipping directly to the tournament. The tournament, though, is decently staged, and once the story gets going Camfield makes good use of the time saved up front.

As in Scott’s story, the titular hero is sidelined by injuries for most of the film, and is really a supporting character. In turn, due weight is given to King Richard the Lion-Hearted (Julian Glover, such a natural in the role that he reprised it for the same director in an episode of “Doctor Who”), returning from the Crusades to deal with his treacherous brother John (Ronald Pickup, much better here than as the voice of Aslan in the BBC Narnia movies), and to Robin Hood (David Robb, a huge improvement over ill-cast, wooden Harold Warrender in the classic version) and his Merry Men (marred only by a less-than-holy Friar Tuck).

In fact, the whole cast is excellent, with the unfortunate exception of Lysette Anthony as Ivanhoe’s love Rowena, who’s totally outclassed by Hussey’s dazzling Rebecca.

Product Notes

Long available only in out-of-print VHS, Ivanhoe has now received a welcome DVD release from Sony.