Colibel Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

Invaderbank The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

Robert Joyner The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

Scotty Burke It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time. Read full review

Leofwine_draca ...nevertheless I ended up greatly enjoying THE DRUM! Conceived as a vehicle to cash in on the popularity of child star Sabu (who'd just appeared in ELEPHANT BOY), THE DRUM is a film which fondly reminisces over the glory days of the British Empire. The film is set in the Northwest Frontier of India in the dying days of the Raj, where the occupying Brit troops are stiff-upper-lip possessing heroes and the Indians are divided into loyal subjects and dastardly moustache-twirling villains.Into this mix is thrown Sabu, playing a slightly conceited but nonetheless loyal young prince, whose friendship with a youthful red-headed drummer leads to plenty of laughs. The plot begins aproper when the dastardly Prince Ghul (Raymond Massey) decides to lead an uprising against the just Captain Carruthers (Roger Livesey, the epitome of the kindly British gentleman).Director Zoltan Korda possesses the ability to make his film look great, full of gung-ho battle scenes and convincing depictions of British colonialism - although the film was actually shot in Wales and most of the Indian characters are Brits in blackface! Still, Valerie Hobson is breathlessly beautiful as Carruther's sensitive wife, there's a pleasing hard edge to the violence (with severed heads tossed through windows and bloodshed) and a great climax which gives the film its title. They sure don't make 'em like this anymore!

xandar27 A rare opportunity to see a rip-roaring, all-colour, flag-waving vision of the British Empire - made by and for the people who supported and believed in it. Produced in 1938, less than a decade before a tired, post-war Britain finally quit India, this is an almost unique chance to witness the Empire's own view of itself. As such, it is a significant historical document.Produced and Directed by the Korda Brothers from their London Studios, many of its scenes were actually shot in the Northwest Frontier of India, (modern Pakistan.) With the participation of the Gordon Highlanders and Indian Army, this has a spectacle that dwarfs many Hollywood features. The story, with its loyal "good" Indians, and treacherous "bad" Indians runs deep with the paternalist ideology which provided the justification for the later Empire. With a firm-jawed main character called Caruthers, (Roger Livesey), whose wife cannot endure the constant beating of the drums, the film seems to be the source of more than a few imperial clichés. Raymond Massey joins the cast as a convincingly sinister villain, and Sabu is the young princely hero. And although it jars today with its casual patronising of the Indians, and an assumption of an almost divine British right to rule far-off lands, it is a grand epic that reflects the last hurrah of a now-vanished era.

Igenlode Wordsmith From 'Kim' to 'Carry On up the Khyber', from the famous to the infamous (stand up, Harry Flashman!), the North-West Frontier has proved a fertile source of conflict both fictional and historical... and deposed rulers and fiery mullahs have figured largely from that day to this. The plot of 'The Drum' cribs heavily (and at one point openly, with an impudently-inserted piece of dialogue listing the historical parallels that had been niggling at me!) from real-life events, especially in Afghanistan, and as other stories before and since have been based on the same material, this can result in a certain 'seen-it-all-before' sensation. But the winning element in this film is the touch of humanity and humour which helps the characters to become more than cardboard templates, from the drummer-boy and his misfortunes to the wry jests of the newly-appointed British representative walking open-eyed into a trap. Not to mention that, after a spate of films with seemingly pointless titles, I found it obscurely satisfying to encounter one where the eponymous instrument is actually significant both to the plot and its climax!The always-excellent Sabu steals the film, as ever, in his role first as a self-possessed princeling and then as a fugitive in exile from his throne; the romantic leads, while well-performed, are less memorable. The tension in the banquet scene is tangible, and Raymond Massey as the usurper brings brains as well as menace to his role. The one element that rather shocked me -- with the exception of the inadvertent glimpse of buttock that reveals exactly what Scotsmen do or don't wear under their kilts! -- was the scene in which the said usurper is shot down by our wounded hero in cold blood, having thrown down his weapon. It's not customary for such an act to be depicted in an apparently approving manner; and certainly not in a film of this period...I must admit that the question of the period itself had me slightly puzzled, although the mention of syncopation in the drum part for the dance should have given me a clue. I had automatically assumed the story to be set in nineteenth-century India in the heyday of the Raj rather than the contemporary world, and with few European civilian fashions on display, there was nothing to disabuse me of this until the heroine made an appearance in jodhpurs, which came as something of a shock! (And the subconscious resonance with the valleys of 'Carry On up the Khyber' turns out to be based in fact: locations from both were shot in Wales...)But 'The Drum' is a rousing adventure as they used to make 'em, in the tradition of 'Charge of the Light Brigade' or 'Northwest Frontier'; if you like the genre, this one is a cracker.

sandy-j The Drum is a great British Empire movie in the tradition of Four Feathers (the Korda version) and Gunga Din. Anyone who gets a thrill from the skirl of bagpipes and a last minute charge to the rescue will be delighted by this film.