THE 100 BEST WAR MOVIES #77 - The African Queen (1951)

 

In 1935, C.S. Forester published his adventure novel The African Queen.  It is probably his most famous stand-alone novel.  He also wrote the Horatio Hornblower series.  The African Queen adds romance to adventure.  It is set in Africa during WWI and involves an odd couple who decide to try to sink a German warship that dominates a strategic lake.  The title refers to the small steamboat that they attempt the task with.  To get to their target, they must navigate a rapid-filled river and overcome numerous obstacles.  Their love develops as they conquer nature.  “The African Queen” had one of the most famous productions in cinema history.  .  In 1951, John Huston made the classic film based on the novel.  Director John Huston insisted on filming half the movie on location in Uganda and the Congo.  The screenplay was written by Huston, James Agee, Peter Viertel, and John Collier.  The adapted screenplay was nominated for an Oscar. The production was beset by climate, critters, and diseases.  Virtually the entire cast and crew suffered from ill health (ex.dysentery) with the notable exceptions of Huston and Humphrey Bogart who inoculated themselves with copious amounts of alcohol.  The teetotaler Katharine Hepburn later wrote of enjoying the experience, but she had to overcome dysentery, drunken pranks from Bogart and Huston, and Huston’s unique directing style.  (Clint Eastwood later made a film about the production entitled “White Hunter Black Heart”.)  The scenes where the two leads are in the water were filmed at a studio near London.  A mockup of the boat was built on a raft for shooting scenes on the boat.  The movie was a big hit with audiences and critics.  It turned out the suits that felt an action / romance about an older couple would be icky were wrong.  Bogart won his only Oscar and the film was nominated for Director, Adapted Screenplay, and Actress.  In the most recent AFI ranking of the best movies it placed #65.  The “African Queen” is now on display as a tourist attraction in Key Largo, Florida.

The movie is set in German East Africa in 1914.  Missionary Samuel Sayer (Robert Morley) and his sister Rose (Hepburn) are conducting a mass for villagers when a rickety old boat captained by Charlie Allnut (Bogart) arrives.  The subsequent tea with the straitlaced Sayers is made more awkward by Allnut’s growling stomach.  Charlie informs them the war is on which they don’t seem concerned about until the Germans almost immediately arrive and conscript the villagers, burn the village, and beat up Samuel who suffers a nervous breakdown and dies soon after.  When Charlie returns he helps bury the missionary and puts Rose aboard.  It doesn’t take long for the feisty Rose to make the ridiculous suggestion they go down the river to the lake to attack the German warship Louisa.  Off the top of her head she comes up with a plan to turn the African Queen into a torpedo delivery system.  Charlie grudgingly gives in to her stronger personality and they start on their adventure.  Those adventures include running some rapids, passing a German fort, going over a waterfall, repairing the propeller shaft, and pulling the boat through a marsh.  But after all that, they still have to ram the boat into a warship that is patrolling the lake.

ACTING:                      A

ACTION:                      N/A

ACCURACY:               N/A

PLOT:                           A

REALISM:                    N/A

CINEMATOGRAPHY:      A

SCORE:                        C

BEST SCENE:  the rapids

BEST QUOTE:  Charlie:  Whose boat is this anyway? I asked you on board 'cause I was sorry for you on account of you losin' your brother and all. What you get for feelin' sorry for people... Well I ain't sorry no more, ya crazy, psalm-singing, skinny old maid!

CRITIQUE:  This is old fashioned entertainment.  It’s an almost perfect blend of adventure and romance.  There is suspense in each of the travails they go through and it builds to a surprising and satisfying ending.  Although a little stodgy, the plot holds up better than some other supposed classics.  The acting by the two leads could not be better.  This is probably Bogart’s best performance and Hepburn matches him.  In her book about the making of the movie, Hepburn wrote that Huston felt that she was playing Rose as too serious.  He suggested she channel Eleanor Roosevelt and adopt her hopeful smile.  She admitted this was the best acting advice she ever got (and from a man she thought at the time was off his rocker).  Bogart and Hepburn appear to be having a lot of fun with their roles (although Bogart hated the comfortless African locales and couldn’t wait to get home).

                The plot has some refreshing unorthodoxy to it.  Rose and Charlie may have a disagreement about the wisdom of the mission at the beginning, but they are not at each other’s throats like in most romances of that (and this) era.  The opposites attract angle is there, but it’s not overemphasized.  The arc of the romance is a bit simplistic and speeded up, but it’s not mushy.  However, it does fit comfortably into the "shared hardships bring people together” school.  Making Rose the more dominant personality is a nice touch, but it is diluted a bit by the obvious Bible defeats booze theme.   The success of the mission, while predictable, takes some interesting turns that could not have been anticipated.  The theme of the movie is where there’s a will, there’s a way.  Throw in a little "God helps them that help themselves".   

                The cinematography is not mesmerizing.  It’s adequate and some credit must go to the difficult conditions much of the movie was shot in.  The film does have more flora and fauna than your typical Tarzan movie.  You will see hippos, apes, elephants, crocodiles, giraffes, lions, and antelopes.  Surprisingly, there are no problems with animals (even when Charlie taunts them in a bit of comic relief).  Charlie does not have to wrestle a crocodile.  They catch hell from the leeches and mosquitoes.  The scenery is beautiful, making the decision to shoot in Africa a wise one.  The one flaw is the pompous score.  It really is intrusive at times.  Give us a break, we know how to feel!  However, the score is exactly what you expect from a 1950’s romance/adventure.

How does the movie compare to the book?  Naturally, the book gives more details than the movie.  The running of the rapids is much more suspenseful.  Rose is an amazing steerswoman in the book.  The period in the reeds is more exhausting and has the malaria thrown in.  Fixing the shaft is more complicated and time consuming.  But other than more details, the journey to the lake is very similar to the book.  The characters are also very similar, other than Charlie being Canadian in the movie.  The book Charlie is meeker and less intelligent.  No surprise that character was given more testosterone.  Rose is a proto-feminist in the book.  She starts as a spinster and ends up an action hero.  She is much more interesting than Charlie and Forester has her dominating Charlie and the narrative.  She blooms as a result of the adventure.  She knows she is coming out of her cocoon.  For 1950s reasons the movie made her more traditional.  And obviously, she could not be having premarital sex, and enjoying it!

            The reason why the movie is better than the book is it keeps the basics and vastly improves the ending.  Forester flubbed the ending badly.  To have Charlie and Rose fail after all they went through may have been realistic, but it hardly was crowd-pleasing.  If Hollywood is anything, it is crowd-pleasing.  The scriptwriters deserve a lot of credit for improving the ending and it is genius.  The twist puts a cherry on top of a movie that was already perfect.