THE BOY AND THE PIRATES Original Daybill Movie Poster Charles Herbert

The Boy and the Pirates is a 1960 film from Bert I. Gordon, the master of giant monster films. It stars a very popular child star of the day in 12-year-old Charles Herbert and Gordon's own daughter, Susan. The story line, that of a little boy and girl trapped on the pirate ship of Blackbeard, ranges from comical at times to downright gruesome. There is a good deal of killing during the course of the film. The cook forces Jimmy at one point to take a fish and "gut and clean it, and save his entrails". There is another moment when Morgan the pirate tries to get Jimmy to reveal his coveted information by threatening to scald his mouth with a red-hot poker.
Nonetheless, it has been described as "an engaging and innovative fantasy so perfect in its service to and embellishment of genre formula, it comes across as both completely familiar, yet breathtakingly original."