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Green Hell
A group of adventurers head deep into South American jungle in search of an ancient Incan treasure.
Release : | 1940 |
Rating : | 5.7 |
Studio : | James Whale Productions, |
Crew : | Art Direction, Art Direction, |
Cast : | Douglas Fairbanks Jr. Joan Bennett John Howard George Sanders Alan Hale |
Genre : | Adventure Romance |
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Rating: 6.2
Reviews
Wow! Such a good movie.
Save your money for something good and enjoyable
At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.
This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.
Well actually, Green Hell is not as bad as all that, it begins strongly and has some decent battles at the end. But what started off promising goes to dust once the two best actors of the movie, George Sanders and Vincent Price, get killed off early on, and Joan Bennett's very irritatingly dull character gets introduced, making a short spout of perhaps unintentional fun turn to tedium after a while. Green Hell doesn't look that lavish and the sets are rather hokey. The dialogue is unbearably corny and the story is full of predictability, a complete lack of credibility(I agree about people sounding too much like they come from Kansas) and contrived situations. James Whale's direction seems disengaged and does little to make anything exciting or thrilling, the two main things that a jungle adventure does need. The acting looks great on paper, but most take their roles too seriously(Douglas Fairbanks Jnr, Joan Bennett) or try hard but are not in the movie anywhere near long enough(George Sanders, Vincent Price). Overall, not a complete disaster but ludicrous, contrived and corny and possibly the worst films of Whale and Price(possibly Fairbanks as well). 3/10 Bethany Cox
Some people know how to make a movie. That is when we get a film.This is an example.This is simple story telling and adventure, with some great scenery.It's set in a jungle as a team of excavators hope to bring back Gold and news of an archaeological find.The key is to have all the elements.We have expert directing, more than adequate editing, and good script writing enough to tell an exciting and interesting story. In today's world of dull routine scripts, this is probably more exciting than a modern audience is used to. This was made in the days when people were smart enough to know de Mille was someone to emulate, and this director does emulate de Mille in many ways, as much as he can with a less than de Mille budget.The next element is believable and interesting characters. We have a slew of them. More than the usual excavation team. Even a few of the natives have interesting, believable, and important roles. Some of the more ignorant red necks of today will scoff at the superstitious ways, but superstitious attitudes are what makes this even more believable. We're at an Information Age cusp right now in which many of the younger people wallow in an Ignorance they aren't aware of, and don't realize what makes a character in 1940 credible.This is excellent story telling and adventure. To deny that is to look like a jealous fool.
Started off promising but got bogged down in the middle with the introduction of Mrs. Richardson (Joan Bennett). Warning, spoilers will most likely be in the rest of the review. It seemed kind of pointless to kill off Vincent Price so early in the movie, a lot was made of how mysterious he was. Also, convenient of George Sanders to kill himself just before they get rescued, this prevents any kind of entanglements there might have been if they all had been rescued. The fun thing to do with this film, is that knowing that director James Whale was gay, is to look at the characters in another light. Isn't it strange that everything was going great with the exploring party made up of just men but once Bennett comes along everything goes to hell? Also what was the deal with John Howard and Douglas Fairbanks Jr.? It sure seemed to me that Howard was carrying a torch for Doug. Oh, the mind reels.
Essentially "Lost Patrol with a Girl"; not enough action to be a true adventure. Nice photography and spotty acting are the main features of Whale's last film. Noble Englishmen exploit grateful natives, finding treasure in an Inca temple. They fight over "the girl" and then are surrounded by savages with poison darts. Good battle scenes at the end. A must for Whale fans, for everyone else it's a moderately amusing time-waster.