A film of its time, lets put it that way - actually, to be fair, its time really was 1920s London stage, where there was a rich tradition of colonial melodramas about angsty white men going ga-ga for some exotic tail. That's when the original play debuted, and the writer, Leon Gordon, did his own adaptation so the spirit is preserved.
There have been some changes - notably making Hedy Lamarr's character Tondeleyo white (well, half-Egyptian, half-Portuguese) so she can marry Richard Carlson without upsetting the Production Code, who had no problem endorsing Walter Pidgeon's dictatorial rule of this part of Africa (he wants to bring back flogging, sentences a man to a year in prison he doesn't deserve to keep things in line) or the depiction of all Africans as simpletons, or Lamarr in brown face.
But the piece does hold dramatically. It's about the difficulties of being colonial officers in Africa - how it drives men around the bend and how they're not liable to make it. (It's not a very positive depiction - no one is happy, everyone is hot and sweaty).
Lamarr is very effective whoever offensive people are liable to find her character. She's not introduced until 30 minutes in, giving her a good build up (others talk about her before then). Then she sets about seducing Carlson - and the story delivers on its promise because they get married, they have sex, she's impatient and then tries to kill him... so Pidgeon tricks her into killing herself.
I'm used to seeing Pidgeon playing cuddly characters so it's weird to see him play a grumpy surly Clarke Gable type role. Frank Morgan is excellent as a boozy doctor the other big part. And Carlson was very good - you can see why people thought it was going to be a big star for so long.
No comments:
Post a Comment