User Reviews

I have looked all over the internet for this particular documentary for almost 3 years and was somehow able to finally find it. I saw it playing on TCM one day, but decided not to watch it, which turned out to be a mistake. Filmed in the late 40s, Savage Splendor is arguably the first serious documentary on Africa, and it's in color. This allows audiences to get a marvelous insight into a continent that tends to be regarded as unimportant in global politics. While most african countries were (and still are) extremely poor, they are rich in wildlife and exotic scenery. From the towering Mount Kilimanjaro to the wide open plains of Kenya, this film dives into things that the average person would find amazing. The documentary itself is sort of a hybrid between a presentation on the natives of Africa and the animals that live there. They show various tribes, how they live and gather food (such as trapping elephants), and the various customs they have. The throne a tribal king sits on is the back of another person, apparently. Because this was made in the 40s, much of Africa was still under european rule. Lots of different animals are shown, such as ostriches, hippos, lions, elephants, zebras, giraffes, vultures, aardvarks, and rhinoceroses. The footage of the animals is quite good, and no doubt required the cameraman to get close to them in order to record something so impressive. This was a dangerous endeavor as even normally docile animals like elephants can charge at a human that ventures into its living space. The rhinoceros in particular is a total pain to catch, as they have huge amounts of energy, run fast, and don't seem to be afraid of anything. In one scene, a rhino even smashes into the side of the tour car and flips it over. As is usually the case with animals, going near their young is a surefire way to make them hostile to you. In all, there isn't really much to say about this film, as it basically just showcases the customs of the people living in certain tribes as well as some animals. I do think it's kind of cruel how some of them are treated though, like when a swarm of vultures are trying to eat a zebra, and the tour car rolls right for them in order to make them scatter. Some of them ate so much they can't even fly away. Another scene shows the men trying to capture aardvarks buried in some dirt. Not to be confused with anteaters, aardvarks (meaning earth pig) are some of the rarest animals to be found anywhere and are hardly seen. Once they catch one, it starts squealing uncontrollably for like 20 seconds. It's just something you probably wouldn't witness in a nature documentary today, because the animals are treated more humanely. To summarize, Savage Splendor is an interesting look into a world that does not really exist anymore, because africa has been decolonized. It is an intriguing look into a vibrant and colorful world of animals and the people who live in close proximity to them. I mostly liked this film because I have looked tirelessly for it and never lost hope that I would find it.

This is an old world nature documentary. Africa is still mostly under colonial rule. The prevailing popular belief is that most African natives are still savages. This film does not persuade otherwise. It is interesting to see old African cultures in practice but it is a parental take on the native population. Armand Denis and Lewis Cotlow are decked out in their colonial safari gears and the natives are living in mud huts. They travel from the west coast through the center and all the way east. The animal nature parts have solid cinematography. The last half seems to be one long animal corral for zoo stocks. There is actual excitement from the rhino hunt. Maybe that's part of the financing or maybe that's expected to have a safari back in the day. It's a look into pre-modern Africa as seen through colonial eyes. There is good and bad about that. It is still an interesting time capsule of a world gone by.

Half wild-life documentary, half ethnographic survey, I could swear I've seen shots from this movie before, in promotional trailers for KING SOLOMON'S MINES and reproduced in HATARI. Given that co-director Armand Denis was a long-time, far-traveling documentary-maker, that's not terribly surprising.

The print I looked at this evening on TCM was in surprisingly poor shape; its color values had not survived well, and some of the shots were taken with a a telephoto lens that could not reveal detail; given the danger of the wild African animals that the movie concerned itself with, from the Ituri Rain Forest of the Congo to the veldts of Tanganika, that's not too surprising either!

This was quite obviously a passion project for the film-makers and the approach their subjects with a great deal of respect; given the hunger of the American public for the world outside of hot and cold-war politics, it did very well for RKO in 1949, grossing more than John Ford's now-classic SHE WORE A YELLOW RIBBON.