Matialth Good concept, poorly executed.

SparkMore n my opinion it was a great movie with some interesting elements, even though having some plot holes and the ending probably was just too messy and crammed together, but still fun to watch and not your casual movie that is similar to all other ones.

Stephanie There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Sarita Rafferty There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

Ross622 John Ford was one of the finest craftsmen in the history of the cinema, and even though this movie isn't one of his greatest films it still is very interesting to watch. During the course of the movie I felt like I was watching an alternative safari version of "The Great Gatsby" but without the triangle between Gatsby Tom and Daisy, but it is kind of a gender difference with this movie dealing with a man and two women. The movie was shot entirely on an African safari just like "King Solomon's Mines" (1950) was only comparison between the two is that this one was a better movie. The movie stars Clark Gable as Vincent Marswell who owns a big game trapping company in the country of Kenya, and in the beginning of the movie he meets an American woman named Eloise Kelly (Ava Gardner) and they start becoming friends after she came to the safari to meet someone that was supposed to be there but never showed up to meet her. Then after Kelly is supposed to leave a married couple show up whose names are Donald Nordley (Donald Sinden) and his wife Linda (Grace Kelly). Marswell and Linda are attracted to each other but it isn't that obvious at first glance even though it gets more obvious. During the making of this movie Clark Gable had a tough time with Ford due to his terrible treatment towards Ava Gardner on the set of the movie and because of that this was the only film that the two men ever worked on together. Ford was an expert with using his surroundings to frame a movie making a movie of his a visual treat to look at, the performances are decent but if I had to choose my personal favorites come from both Gable and Kelly, though I thought that Gardner could have tweaked her performance a little bit even though it was very good and because of her work she along with Grace Kelly got Oscar nominations. Like "King Solomon's Mines" this is a very informative film to watch and the cinematography by none other than Robert Surtees makes the scenery of both films very breathtaking. Though this isn't a great movie it is a very well-written one even though the script could have been improved upon. Even though I still would recommend this movie to anyone interested in learning about African wildlife.

Rlipt8 It was very disturbing to me to see what appeared to be a real shooting of a black leopard which while on a tree branch reacted horribly to being shot with what looked like a real bullet wound.I wonder if that was stock footage from a real shooting or somehow done with a tranquilizer gun.

museumofdave Western director John Ford was more or less asleep at the wheel on this jungle epic, with the stars given a tepid script rife with fifties clichés about the roles men and women play in the moral scheme of things. Gable had done the same role some 20 years earlier in the hugely entertaining, zippy precode Red Dust with sassy Jean Harlow and salty Mary Astor, but Grace Kelly and Ava Gardner, while holding their own in the beauty department, are given next to nothing to work with, except perhaps for Ava's tussle in the mud with a baby elephant. Gable goes through the motions of being The Great White Hunter with his customary professionalism, but looks fairly bored. The idea of hunting down and killing gorillas is certainly as outmoded today as the romantic clichés--but there is some excellent footage of native African dances and some nice scenery,though nothing one can't see to more advantage in a National Geographicspecial. Recommended only for star fans as Saturday matinée material.

Robert J. Maxwell This is a remake of "Red Dust" from the 1930s and Clark Gable plays the same role -- the white professional guide through the African jungle who also collects animals for zoos and circuses. He's hired by a naive anthropologist and his wife, Kelly, to take them into the bush and shoot movies of gorillas and trap a baby gorilla to study back home.Gable's dalliance with tough but good-natured Ava Gardner is interrupted but he doesn't mind, once he gets an eyeful of the delicate blond Grace Kelly. She's overwhelmed by the cloud of pheromones that follows Gable about and he, in turn, decides that this time it's for keeps.But then there's that awkward business of letting the wimpy husband in on their plans. And that noisome Ava Gardner is always hanging around, all knowingly, making wisecracks about the new love affair. I mean, it gets racy too. Their truck passes a male elephant who trumpets and uncurls his trunk straight out into the air. "Reminds me of somebody I know," cracks Gardener.In the end, Gable comes to his senses, tricks Kelly into loathing him, and marries the woman he was truly meant to be with, the one who is as resilient and durable as he is.It wasn't an easy shoot. Director Ford was beginning to feel his age. Gable insisted on going off to hunt big game. Ford thought it was dangerous and stupid. Frank Sinatra, married to Ava Gardner at the time, showed up on location and everyone expected him to act like the Chairman of the Board -- "Here, pal, here's fifty; go take a hike." Instead, at Ford's request, he was put to use making spaghetti for the crew. Gable had been through much tribulation since "Red Dust", twenty years earlier, and had begun drinking, but he'd help up well, considering.Grace Kelly should have been right for the part of the naive young wife. She looks appealing enough and seems frangible, as if anyone could break one of her long bones just be pressing it too hard, but she's allowed to overact. Ava Gardner never looked more attractive or sexier. Jean Harlow brought a note of stronger vulgarity to the role. Gardner seems a little too nice, despite the acidulous dialog.The movie is entertaining and colorful but seems oddly dated. Every movie about Africa is compelled to give us shots of African animals that, I suppose, a hundred years earlier were still novel. Yes, that's a cheetah, alright. We saw a National Geographic Special about cheetahs just last week. Fastest mammals on earth, y'know? They're no longer gape worthy. They have to play some part in the story if we're going to pay attention any longer.And I don't know why people don't leave gorillas and other primates alone. There aren't that many of them left. We're destroying them through habitat destruction and poaching. Why would anyone want to point a high-powered rifle at a great ape and shoot it dead? They don't do anything but eat fruit and vegetables. I wonder if humans might have more compassion for gorillas if they saw them naked and shaved, as I did when I studied comparative primatology. The male appendage is positively tiny compared to ours. Well, that probably wouldn't make us pause before killing them anyway. We'll stop when there are no more left.Anyway, it's a satisfying movie that ought to interest the family, assuming the kids don't grasp the symbolic significance of elephant trunks. "Red Dust" -- studio-bound as it is -- is still better.