Blackbeard’s Ghost

Release Date: February 8, 1968

Watch Date: February 8, 2025

“Award-winning actor Peter Ustinov stars in this hilarious fantasy as the ghost of the legendary pirate Blackbeard. The once-blackhearted scoundrel materializes in a small New England town, cursed to wander in limbo until he performs a good deed. He gets his chance when he decides to help a local college track team-one that hasn’t a ghost of a chance of winning. Blackbeard finds himself full of team spirit and dispensing his own brand of invisible coaching in this warmhearted comedy that will have you laughing from his first fade-in to his final fade-out.”

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   We were supposed to watch Deadfall last night, and neither Bob nor myself were looking forward to it very much. I had watched the film exactly once and hadn’t been impressed and while I normally try very hard to not influence Bob’s impression of films before we watch them, I really, really wasn’t looking forward to reexperiencing Deadfall and I couldn’t exactly pretend that I was.

   But then we looked it up on Disney+ and it had been removed and I have never been happier, besides, you know, the birth of our children and so on and so forth, so instead we moved on to the next movie on the list, and one of my weirdly favorite old Disney movies – Blackbeard’s Ghost.

   I discovered this movie while hanging out with a girl friend about 5 years back, we threw it on for a laugh, it was October, it had a ghost, and it had Dean Jones (my still all time favorite actor for no discernable reason) and it was just the right amount of stupid and charming. I’ve only ever grown to love it more and more, as I’ve recognized more actors from previous Disney films, as I’ve stopped looking for how the stunts are done. As I’ve learned to just enjoy this movie’s heart.

   Bob, for his part, found it just about as charming as I did the first time. The premise is not one of Disney’s best. And recasting Blackbeard, a notoriously bloodthirsty and cruel man as someone who can be redeemed, and funny, and charming? Seems like a bit of a stretch. But it all works out in the end. The chemistry between the love interest and Dean exists this time, unlike their first feature in The Ugly Daschund. The villain isn’t really too intimidating, but he is – at least – slimy and swarmy. And that’s something. Blackbeard is done perfectly, from the way he moves to his voice, and they manage to make him more like a loveable rascal than a man who’s, as he states very plainly, got the blood of thousands on his hands.

   The track team wasn’t really necessary, but it kind of has an Absent-Minded Professor air to it, except it doesn’t go on for quite as long and the variety in the events makes for a much more interesting watch. Still, the movie should really be billed as trying to save some old ladies’ pirate club’s boarding house, and not so much “Blackbeard helps a track team”.

   If you haven’t ever seen this film, simply because it’s not a well known old Disney classic, I would highly recommend giving it a shot. Is it going to be the best movie you watch this year? Absolutely not. But it will keep you entertained, it will make you laugh, and it will, possibly, at the end, give you a little bit of the good feels.

*As a complete aside, it was only as I was posting this that I realized we had watched this film on it’s 57th birthday, and now isn’t that exciting?*