Bwana the devil
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | Bwana the devil |
| Original title | Bwana Devil |
| Country of production | United States |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1951 |
| length | 85 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 12 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Arch Oboler |
| script | Arch Oboler |
| production | Arch Oboler |
| music | Gordon Jenkins |
| camera | Joseph F. Biroc |
| cut | John Hoffman |
| occupation | |
| |
Bwana the Devil is a 1952 3D film by American director Arch Oboler that began the heyday of 3D films in the United States in the 1950s.
The film takes up real events that occurred in Kenya in 1898 and are also described in more recent times in the film " The Ghost and the Darkness " ( The Ghost and the Darkness , 1996).
The film was also briefly titled Spear In The Sand and The Lions of Gulu .
At 85 minutes, the German version was six minutes longer than the English version.
action
At the end of the 19th century, the first railway line in Africa was built in British East Africa under the most difficult conditions.
Leader responsible for this are Jack Hayward (Robert Stack) and Dr. Angus Ross (Nigel Bruce), who not only have to fight the heat and disease, but also face a pair of man-eating lions. When their own measures are unsuccessful, three big game hunters are sent from Great Britain to take care of the lions.
The hunters arrive with Hayward's wife Alice (Barbara Britton), who wants to see her husband again after a long separation. The big game hunters go on the trail of the lions, but are killed one by one by them. So Jack Hayward still has to prove (to himself?) That he is not a weakling and personally goes on the hunt for the lions, whereby his wife is also in danger. Ultimately, he succeeds in killing the lions and saving his wife.
technology
With this film, the first large-scale production in 3D, a relatively brief boom began in the USA. The color film was shot in two-strip “Natural Vision” and therefore had to be shown in the cinemas with two synchronously coupled projectors. The cameramen Lothrop Worth and Friend Baker had developed the system according to the polarization principle of Edwin H. Land in 1952 to be ready for practical use. They sold it to the screenwriter ML Gunzberg and his brother Julian Gunzburg , an ophthalmologist, who wanted to bring it to the market under the name "Natural Vision". After both were presented to some film companies with their development, but constantly rejected, it was the independent producer Arch Oboler who saw new potential in this development to lure viewers who had lost on television back to the cinema.
The audience watched the film with cheaply made disposable cardboard glasses with polarizing foils and loved it. The criticism of the film reviewers of the film was devastating, but has been put into perspective over the years. Today the film is considered a classic.
Reviews
“Man-eating lions hindered the construction of a railroad in Africa at the turn of the century. Primitive adventure film, for which - as the first commercial 3-D production - was advertised with the slogan "A lion on your lap". "
Others
- Actor Nigel Bruce is better known to many as Dr. Watson in the Sherlock Holmes films with Basil Rathbone .
- The actor Robert Stack is better known to television viewers than Eliot Ness in the black and white television series The Untouchables .
Web links
- Bwana Devil in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- The film at the World 3D Film Expo. (with trailer)
Individual evidence
- ^ Ray Zone: Stereoscopic Cinema & the Origins of 3-D Film, 1838-1952 . University Press of Kentucky, 2007. ISBN 978-0813124612
- ↑ Bwana, the devil. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed January 14, 2017 .