HATARI
DIRECTED BY HOWARD HAWKS
PRODUCED BY HOWARD HAWKS/ PAUL HELMICK
MUSIC BY HENRY MANCINI
A MALABAR PRODUCTION
PARAMOUNT PICTURES
Information from IMDb
Plot Summary
John Wayne and his ensemble cast cavort over the African landscape filling orders from zoo's for wild animals. Bruce Cabot plays "the Indian", a womanizing sharpshooter who is gored by a rhino in the opening scenes of the film. This becomes a running theme through the movie; their bad luck in catching rhinos, and provides the climactic ending chase. While Bruce is in the hospital, Elsa Martinelli shows up as a woman photographer from a Swiss zoo, and John wants to send her packing. She strongarms the Duke into letting her stay by promising that her zoo will buy most of their animals this season if she's allowed to go along on the hunts and take photos. Hardy Kruger, Gerard Blain, Michelle Girardon and Valentin de Vargas round out the group. They traipse over the African landscape capturing animals; Elsa also has a running gag where she collects baby elephants as the movie goes along. In the end she's acquired three of them.
Summary written by Marta Dawes
Full Cast
John Wayne .... Sean Mercer
Hardy Krüger .... Kurt Muller (as Hardy Kruger)
Elsa Martinelli .... Anna Maria 'Dallas' D'Allesandro
Red Buttons .... Pockets
Gérard Blain .... Charles 'Chips' Maurey (as Gerard Blain)
Bruce Cabot .... Little Wolf aka The Indian
Michèle Girardon .... Brandy de la Court (as Michele Girardon)
Valentin de Vargas .... Luis Francisco Garcia Lopez
Eduard Franz .... Dr. Sanderson
Queenie Leonard .... Nurse (scenes deleted)
Jon Chevron .... Joseph (uncredited)
Sam Harris .... Man in store (uncredited)
Cathy Lewis .... Voice of Radio Operator (uncredited)
Eric Rungren .... (uncredited)
Henry Scott .... Sikh clerk (uncredited)
Emmett Smith .... Bartender (uncredited)
Jack Williams .... Man (uncredited)
Writing credits
Harry Kurnitz (story)
Leigh Brackett
Original Music
Henry Mancini
Cinematography
Russell Harlan
Stunts
Carey Loftin .... stunts (uncredited)
Chuck Roberson .... stunt double: John Wayne (uncredited)
Ted White .... stunts (uncredited)
Jack Williams .... stunts (uncredited)
Trivia
* According to director Howard Hawks, all the animal captures in the picture were performed by the actual actors; no stuntmen or animal handlers were substituted onscreen. The rhino really did escape, and the actors really did have to recapture it-- and Hawks included the sequence for its realism.
* Congo, the baby elephant in the filming, died in November 2000 at the Dubbo Zoo. He was the only male elephant in captivity in Australia at the time.
* Hatari means "danger" in Swahili.
* Composer Henry Mancini wrote a brief piece of incidental music to go with a scene where a baby elephant is taken for a walk. The simple little song became an international hit as "Baby Elephant Walk", and has been recorded by a large number of artists and in many different styles.
* Much of the action sequence audio had to be re-dubbed due to John Wayne's cursing while wrestling with the animals.
* Howard Hawks originally wanted to make the film with John Wayne and Clark Gable, but Paramount would not raise the budget to finance Gable.
Jan Oelofse, the animal supervisor, captured and tamed all the animals in Africa; the elephants, leopard, the cheetahs, and flew with 40 animals aboard a DC6 across Africa, through South America to Hollywood to continue scenes shot in Hollywood
Red Buttons, a liberal Democrat, later said that he greatly regretted his "gross misapprehension" line.
According to Hardy Kruger's autobiography, the film crew rented all vehicles available in Tanzania, even the privately owned ones.
Howard Hawks allegedly bought Elsa Martinelli's tight fitting safari suits himself at a New York department store.
Little Wolf was a chief of the Cheyenne tribe in 1878. He, and another chief, led the Cheyenne off their Oklahoma reservation and took them back to their homeland in Montana. This despite hundreds of U.S. Cavalry who tried to stop them. This was called the "Cheyenne Autumn Trail" and is the basis for the movie Cheyenne Autumn (1964).
Budgeted at $6 million, Hatari! was filmed in East Africa from November 1960 to May 1961. All on-location shooting took place in Tanzania – Mount Meru, Serengeti National Park, Arusha National Park and Tanganjika National Park. Reportedly, John Wayne bagged an elephant while on the Dark Continent, killing it with a .458 Winchester Magnum rifle.
Many critics carped that the film seemed like a lazy vacation for Hawks. They were partly right - there was no finished script and Hawks relished the chance of filming what he wanted on location in Tanganyika--now Tanzania--far away from the watchful eye of the studio, happily burning through their $6 million budget.
Goofs
* Audio/visual unsynchronized: During one of the animal chase scenes, the truck makes screeching sounds as it turns, though it is not on a paved road.
* Audio/visual unsynchronized: Several of the animals (especially the rhino) make sounds that they don't make in the wild.
* Continuity: While riding on the front of a Jeep, Wayne is water-soaked when the vehicle runs through a stream; in all subsequent scenes, Wayne is dry.
* Factual errors: When the doctor needs a blood donor for Little Wolf near the beginning of the film, he states that it will be difficult to find suitable blood because the type is AB-. In fact though the type itself is rare, an AB- recipient can accept blood from any Rh- donor: A-/B-/o- are all ok, and type-specific AB- blood isn't required. Rh- blood is less common than Rh+, but not that rare (particularly o-, the universal donor).
* Continuity: Side shots of Dallas standing in a red shirt under a porch with two other people show them all in shadow, while the frontal shots are all in direct sunlight.
* Continuity: The crate used to transport the animals is taken off the truck to load an animal, and in the next scene, it is back on the truck with no explanation.
* Continuity: When Sean Mercer first catches Dallas with cold cream on her face, there is no cream on her chin; the scene cuts to Sean, and then when it cuts back to Dallas, she has cream covering her entire face, including her chin.
* Factual errors: The group is returning from the hospital in the two vehicles; all the characters are singing on the radio with each other. This cannot be done over this type of radio. Only one vehicle can talk over the radio at one time.
* Continuity: In the opening scene where they are chasing a rhino, The Indian can be seen clutching his left leg where the rhino will gore him in a later shot a few seconds later. It appears to be a longer shot of the one just after the rhino gores him.
* Continuity: In the opening sequence, chasing the Rhino, the catching truck is turning left and you can see half of the windshield is missing and the character of Dallas is in the cab. In the preceding few seconds and the following scene Pockets is alone in the cab. An almost identical take is later used in the buffalo chase.
* Continuity: While Sean is showing Pockets how to milk a goat, and Timbo scares the line of goats, Sean falls backwards onto the ground with the bucket of goats milk landing on the ground behind him. When the angle changes, the bucket of goat's milk is now on top of Sean's head.
* Factual errors: It is impossible to sing into a two-way radio and hear the other party at the same time.
* Continuity: When the jeep is stalled in the river and Chips spots the alligator and warns Kirk, you can see that the water level is at the top of the front left tire. When Kirk connects the chain to the truck to pull the jeep out of the river, the water level on the front left tire is half way down. Either the jeep moved closer to the bank or the river level fell dramatically.
* Miscellaneous: The aforementioned missing left windshield of the catching truck, when in place, is also hinged along the top. Sometimes, from the passenger side of the vehicle you can see the hinge and a visible gap between the windshield and the cab frame. In addition, the windshield cracks partway open at the film's beginning. Racing across the uneven terrain of the Ngorongoro Crater, the catching truck goes hurtling over a ridge, and as it slams down, the left panel windshield comes ajar.
* Continuity: In the opening chase when Sean yells, "Watch her Pockets! Don't lose her!" he is facing to the rear of the catching truck and holding the pole in that direction. The rhinoceros is obviously behind them. The film then cuts to the erroneous take from the buffalo pursuit with Sean facing to the front. As noted, Dallas is in the passenger seat!
* Continuity: Pockets grip on and placement of his beer bottle keeps changing. In the scene where Dallas and he have their first "heart to heart", he sometimes switches his hand hold on the bottle from one shot to the next or has the bottle above the arm rest then suddenly below. The cigarette pack he takes out of his breast pocket a second time and holds in his left hand? That too, is back in the pocket come the cut.
* Plot holes: Dallas makes no further attempt to finish dressing herself after her distraction causes Pockets to crash the vehicle.
* Continuity: When Wayne as Sean Mercer ask to have the ropes loosened on the fallen rhinoceros, both it and he are well behind the catching truck. However, in the following medium and close-up shots, when the rhino slashes his horn at Wayne, the animal's head is even with the catching truck's passenger door. Also, Wayne's dub: "Kasa kamba! Loosen this up a little." is repeated.
* Continuity: Driving in circles? The crew's trip to the hospital, during the main credits, traverses the same countryside hours apart. The Film Editor and the Technical Advisor's credits cover a late afternoon pan shot. Three images later, though the sun has set, Howard Hawk's credit is covering the identical landscape pan we just saw. Poor Little Wolf.
* Continuity: During the zebra chase scene, (the scene where the chase truck plunges into the water while John Wayne is sitting on the front and gets soaked but is dry in later shots), there are shots looking back at the truck showing Dallas leaning out the left window behind John Wayne with one arm hanging out, however during that chase there are several short scenes of the interior of the truck that are mixed in, showing the driver (Red Buttons) and Dallas sitting inside the truck commenting to each other on the chase and Dallas is not hanging out of the window, then the next scene shows her hanging out again.
* Continuity: Prior to the giraffe capture when Dallas is running towards the truck, then jumps in, at the compound, and tries to finish dressing, she is wearing neutral color boots. After the capture, back at the compound, she is wearing red shoes or boots that seem to match the red shirt she is wearing.
Filming Locations
Arusha National Park, Tanzania
Meru, Tanzania
Mount Meru, Tanzania
Serengeti National Park, Tanzania
Tanganjika National Park, Tanzania
Tanzania
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