Based on George Bernard Shaw’s 1897 play of the same name, The Devil’s Disciple features the third on-screen pairing of Kirk Douglas and Burt Lancaster (after 1947’s I Walk Alone and Gunfight at the O.K. Corral in 1957). Though Lancaster is top-billed and also served as co-producer, he stands aside time and again to let his old pal Kirk have the spotlight.
In fact, even Laurence Olivier, in a smaller role as an English general, steals more scenes than Lancaster.
Set in New Hampshire during the American Revolution, The Devil’s Disciple opens with the planned hanging of an alleged traitor to the British crown. The condemned man’s youngest son, Christie Dudgeon (Neil McCallum), darts into town and interrupts church services to ask Reverend Anthony Anderson (Lancaster) to intervene and save his father. Knowing full well the elder Dudgeon is a loyal British citizen, the Reverend agrees.
Unfortunately, they arrive too late: Christie’s father has already been hanged. What’s more, Major Swindon (Harry Andrews), second-in-command to General Burgoyne (Olivier) of the Royal Army, has ordered that the body remain strung-up in the public square, to serve as a warning for any potential revolutionaries. Reverend Anderson protests, but to no avail.
Later that night, a lone horseman rides into town, cuts down the body, and takes it to Reverend Anderson’s church for a proper burial. The horseman, it turns out, is none other than Richard Dudgeon (Douglas), the estranged eldest son of the deceased. A cynic who openly opposes the British, Richard Dudgeon, previously disowned by his family, is as shocked as anyone to discover that, when his father’s will is read, he stands to inherit the entirety of the family’s fortune!
Rev. Anderson, ignoring the pleas of his wife Judith (Janette Scott), attempts to befriend Richard Dudgeon, if for no other reason than to convince the now-wealthy revolutionary to live a peaceful life. But as the injustices carried out by the English army mount, including an arrest warrant issued for the Reverend himself for burying the elder Dudgeon, this man of peace begins to wonder if it isn’t time to join Richard Dudgeon and the other rebels to rid themselves of British tyranny once and for all.
This desire for justice grows even stronger when Richard Dudgeon is himself mistaken for Reverend Anderson, taken into custody, and condemned to death!
It might all sound very serious, and there are moments throughout The Devil’s Disciple that are, indeed, no laughing matter, beginning with the opening: the hanging of the elder Dudgeon. For most of the film, Lancaster’s Rev. Anderson also remains quite dour, a determined man who lets his faith steer his actions until pushed to his breaking point.
But it’s the humor of George Bernard Shaw that takes center stage whenever Douglas and Olivier are on-screen. Douglas’s Richard Dudgeon doesn’t seem to take anything seriously, and the initial exchange between he and Rev. Anderson is as witty as they come. Douglas is excellent in the part, and while Lancaster is also strong as the well-intentioned Anderson, Kirk outshines his frequent co-star at every turn. Also funny is Laurence Olivier as General Burgoyne, whose irritation at the frequent mistakes made by Major Swindon generate their share of laughs (especially funny is the sequence where Burgoyne and his army are making their way through a forest, only to be stopped every mile or so by a tree across the road, cut down by the rebels).
Lancaster does have his moments, especially towards the end when his character gets involved in a firefight between the British and Colonial armies (a scene that is simultaneously exciting and hilarious). That said, The Devil’s Disciple is, for the most part, the Kirk Douglas / Laurence Olivier show, and these two powerhouses absolutely deliver.
Rating: 9 out of 10
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