AllMovie

Samuel Goldwyn, Jr. gave The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn a pretty lavish production, and the picture is quite lovely to look at, especially in Ted. D. McCord's golden-hued color cinematography. It also boasts an especially fine background score from the pen of the one and only Jerome Moross that is full of vigor and excitement. Unfortunately, the film itself, while certainly watchable, is not as exciting and involving as that score, for a variety of reasons. Primary among them is the miscasting of its leads. Eddie Hodges is a cute and personable performer, but he in no way resembles the rough-edged nature's boy that is Huck. Hodges is the kind of kid whose cheeks you just want to pinch because he's so adorable; Huck might inspire a flickering of that feeling, but it would be tempered by the realization that your fingers would get awfully dirty doing that pinching and that you might also get a few teeth marks on your fingers in the process. Archie Moore presents a physically powerful Jim, but he's a lightweight in the acting department and so this crucial character fails to deliver in key scenes. Michael Curtiz's direction is also surprisingly unimaginative, and the screenplay bowdlerizes the original source a bit too much. On the plus, side, however, the supporting cast is quite good, with special praise due Tony Randall's immensely entertaining King.