Blood, along with an assortment of rebels, is convicted of treason and sold into slavery on a Jamaica plantation owned by cruel tyrant Colonel Bishop (Lionel Atwill). Significant roles among the slave include Ross Alexander as ship navigator Pitt and Guy Kibbee as garrulous Hagthorpe.
Blood's fortunes improve when his skills as doctor help the gout-ridden foot of the Jamaican governor (George Hassell). He also develops a love-hate relationship with Olivia de Havilland, the beautiful and impetuous niece of the despised Col. Bishop.
One day a Spanish Naval ship arrives to capture the island. Blood and his fellow slaves take advantage of the chaos by seizing the vessel as their own. They sail to the high seas and begin a lucrative career as pirates.
While on shore leave, Blood decides for some reason to join forces with womanizing French pirate Levasseur (Basil Rathbone). Shortly later, Levasseur captures an English ship containing lovely de Havilland and nebbish diplomat Lord Willoughby (Henry Stephenson). To protect the virtue of de Havilland, Blood fights a duel with Levasseur, with predictable results.
Blood accepts an offer by Willoughby to become an English naval captain in return for a full pardon for himself and his crew, just in time to fight the French fleet for control of Jamaica. Because it is a movie, Blood is made governor, wins the heart of de Havilland, and has the last laugh on the now powerless Colonel Bishop.
How others will see it. Captain Blood was a box office smash, and led to many other Warner Bros films reuniting Flynn and de Havilland with director Curtiz. The present movie received a nomination for Best Picture along with write-in nods for Best Director and best adapted screenplay.
Today, the film has more than 7K user votes at imdb.com, and impressive total for a movie made just five years into the sound era. The user ratings are high at 7.7 and are fairly consistent across all demographics. Most viewers overlook the implausible aspects of the characters and story and instead embrace the adventure and romance.
How I felt about it. Captain Blood can only be a fictional character. No one else during the 17th century could show such insolence to authority on so many occasions and keep his head. We find it difficult to believe that a dozen slaves in a rowboat could seize the prize of the Spanish fleet. We find it ridiculous that Blood would imperil his life, and that of the crew, to return de Havilland to Jamaica with her presumed virginity intact. We find it even more ridiculous that Blood would avert a mutiny with a few lines of reverse psychology.
We also wonder how fifty-something Guy Kibbee could keep his life, much less his pot belly, as a soldier against the king, as a condemned prisoner, as a slave, and as a pirate. We also roll our eyes as de Havilland and Flynn switch places in their relationship, each maintaining an air of superiority over the other despite a status of bought and sold. It is also a stretch that both Blood and crew would believe, much less accept, Willoughby's offer to give up piracy in return for service in the King's Navy.