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Date Watched

November 22, 2020

This 1935 classic is certainly a product of its time, full of blatant racism, sexism, and questionable acting. Based on H. Rider Haggard's 1887 novel of the same name. Like his victorian contemporaries, Haggard gives us a world of exploration, swashbuckling heroes, and Victorian sensibilities and ideas about race, morality, and civilization – which are all carried faithfully into the movie. The movie itself is a stilted affair that falls flat on several fronts. While it impresses with some set pieces, the whole production feels small for the story it wants to tell. In an odd bit of 1935 American revisionism, the film ends with a clumsily tacked on epilogue espousing some clap trap sentimentalism.