Posts from Ravenslight in thread „Hatari (1962)“

Actually, i think that those are the very reasons that so many people do not care for this movie in mainstream america, can not speak for elsewhere. I have spoken or shared the movie with many people because I so dearly love it and what I generally here is that the scenery is beuatiful but that they have issues with the way the animals are handled etc.. and I also attempt to remind them of these very important facts

You can not watch a movie made circa 1960 and expect it to meet the same standards of today. It would be the same as watching a movie about say slavery and saying that it is an awful movie because slavery is norm in the movie.. It does not make the movie bad, it simply projects an idea of what was the norm for the period the movie represents
I dearly love the Duke and his movies. I share my movies all the time, but I also make an attempt to educate when I share movies. I generally enclose a little note if I know the person is an ardent feminist and I am loaning McClintock, to remind them that up until the 1960's women were handled significantly differently than since that time. The spanking scene and the way that John "manhandles " O'hara is often frowned on. Well, i remind people that the movie is about a different era, made before feminism was the norm.

Actually as an interesting side note. Hardy Kruger gave up his acting career when he bought the "Momela Game Preserve" and ran it for aproximately 13 years when the political arena got too dangerous he had to abandon it and return to germany and to his acting career. It lay in near ruins until about 5 years ago or so when a german couple bought the farm and restored it to it glorious heydey and now it runs the place as a bed and breakfast and also offers screenings of hatari in the rooms where many of the films scenes were filmed. They restored it with period furniture and decorations, to include no tv's visible etc

I think it is amazing that the place caused such a deep stir within Kruger that he literally walked away from his life to live there and farm and do very well until the government became so unstable
It is obvious that the region has been inspiring heartfelt awe for sometime

Hatari is one of those movies that when the world seems overwhelming, when the world seems too cruel or complicated or even just too lacking in taste and class.. it is one of those movies that reminds of us a time when ladies were ladies and gentlemen were just that, all man, but with that side that showed a man knew how to treat a lady.. where courtsey was the norm, where I dont know, it just is a refreshing, happy movie that can wash the dirt and scum of modern day away for a couple of hours
Nicole

No I havent, but I have read significantly. Yes the land itself looks the same, but the wildlife that is there, there are very few free ranging elephants not on preserves, same for rhino's , wilderbeest, etc.. some aniamls like the addax have diminished to where they were thought to be extinct in the last ten years until a national geographic explorer spotted a couple, litterally just 2 were spotted..

The Tanzania/Kenya area or what is called the Eastern Arc is one of the top 25 hotspots for loss of endemic species, mammal, reptile and plant. It is also considered to be what is know a hyperhot spt.. meaning that it is at the highest risk for loss of species.. true conservation efforts did not start until the mid 1990's. So much of the land was stripped for farming and big game hunting that there has been a huge loss..

Big game hunters still hunt for trophies.. local taxidermist say that in the last 10 years...the big cats are being taken younger and younger so that many of the trophy cats are only 3-4 times bigger than the average house cat, because they are not reaching maturity.

There are 307 species in Tanzania on the threatened or endangered species list, many mammals and even more in the fauna . What I am getting at is this, there is little protection, what has come is coming way late in the game.

Steve Irwin was very much into conservationism, which most people did not realize.. they only saw him as the zany animal person, but in reality his true life long passion was conservation around the world.. which he put his money and his dedication behind.. there are really very few actors or personalities that I respect.

I have great respect for John Wayne, Steve Irwin, Angelina Jolie, Patrick Swayze ( he is very much an average person- a friend of mine who passed away last year trained arabian horses and comes from a long line of arabian horse trainers, of the international caliber... spoke highly of patrick saying he was an average person.. did not think of himself as better.. and was very very dedicated to family-which is a rare quality in today's stars) and I also respect Patrick Wayne as well.. but that is pretty much my long list of stars that I have great respect for as both stars and as humans.. Anyway, there is some really , really good information on the tanzania situation if you visit Critical Ecosystem Patnership Fund. There are a whole lot of other places on the web to research it, but this one has extensive scientific research, there is way too much sensationism out there and this site is not about that, it is about true scientific research
Nicole

The reason that tranquilizer darts were not used at the time this movie was made was that in the early 1960's they were not available as of yet. They are a fairly modern invention. They are not also entirely safe. The daarts themselves can cause permenant if not fatal harm. Also, the drugs used can also cause serious injury and or death. Also if an animal is only grazed by the dart then there is the chance that it could escape a capture team and die or be injured in the drugged and drunken state. Many animals do not tolerate tranquilzers well at all.

Here is an idea.. trans that are considered safe for horses.. ace.. can cause male horses to have serious life threatening injuries to their privates.. to remain out, rather than retracted, it is a about a 1 in 10,000 injury but it happens, also that particular trank known as ace, has been known probably 1 out of 10 times to make horses go the opposite way, making them really hopped up. Another trank used in horses called Rompun, often makes horses what is known as jkicky, they will kick anything they sense move behind them.. see where I am going with this, these are drugs that have been used on hundreds of thousands if not millions of equines and they can have serious side effects or problems, think about using darts on animals that they have not been extensively tested or used on, in the wilds.. which is why darting is a problem. Even now, most of the time, problem wildlife are trapped or killed rather than darted... or at least in the US.

I love the movie and I am an animal conservationist, but I also realize when the movie was made and accept it for what it is. Also in all honesty for many people other than the old wild kingdom you dont see the african plains looking like that anymore, it is a step back time. game is not nearly as plentiful now..
nicole

It is funny, but in all honesty, I dearly love this movie. It is one of my all time favorites. I am an animal conservationist, a female and in my 30's and yet, I am able to look at the movie from the time it was made. I also know that the methods used were the most humane at the time. Granted we have other methods to capture animals today and there are few places in the world where they are captured because they have been hunted to near extinction in so many places... but we are talking about a movie made almost 50 years ago. I love it, my four year old daughter also dearly loves it. It is amazing but she can sit and watch it 2 or 3 times in a row and in all honesty I would much rather her watch Hatari than much of what is on in the world. If you watch them handle the animals other than the actual captures, the animals are handled with love and tenderness, watching Sean take a thorn out of the little animals shoulder, or Brandy and Chips give the hyena's a bath, or dallas loving on the baby elephants.

I love the movie because it shows a totally different side of John Wayne, it shows a light, humorous side. It also shows a side of him that is rather amazing. The fact that he was a very capable animal handler. He was a good rider and watching him in this movie, well handling all sorts of animals, roping animals, it is amazing.

I think this is a great movie, but like all movies that can be dated, you have to watch them with the understanding of the time frame that the movie is supposed to represent , as well as the time when it was made.

Nicole