World Famous Comics: Forbidden Territory: Stanley's Search for Livingstone
Forbidden Territory: Stanley's Search for Livingstone
Starring: Dylan Baker, Edward Fox, Christopher Fulford, Nigel Hawthorne, Dafydd Hywel Average Rating: Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 Audience Rating: R (Restricted) Binding: DVD Format: Color, DVD-Video, NTSC Label: Platinum Disc Number of Items: 1 Region Code: 1 Release Date: July 05, 2005 Running Time: 91 minutes Theatrical Release Date: 1997
Beautiful depiction of a time in history I ordered this video because my son was doing a project on world explorers and his subject was Dr. Livingston. But when I saw this movie, it took me back in time and into a world not too far from our present time, but yet so distant. The photography, acting and pace are beautiful. It is amazing to see a world from less than 150 years ago when a large continent was uncharted, devoid of automobiles, airplanes, railways, satellites, cameras, tape recorders, etc.; and a handful of people were walking a few miles each day, taking notes in journals and charting the dark continent. This movie is a time piece.
My only disappointment was that it covers only the last days of Livingston's life and not his discovery of Victoria Falls, etc. Another movie I recommend along with this is "Mountains of the Moon" which has nothing to do with Livingston but is a few years down the time line, and is a spectacular adventure to discover the source of the Nile.
A Visit to My most recent order from Amazon.com was Forbidden Territory: Stanley's Search for Livingstone. While this wasn't a great movie, it was a well-made movie that was more than worth the $[...] I paid for it. The film does the job I ask of it: portraying the Dark Continent, the Africa of adventure.
A National Geographic Television presentation, Forbidden Territory perfectly captures the period. We see African henchman, Europe's finest explorers and its basest adventurers, the mustachioed, tuxedo-clad "armchair geographers" of Royal Geographic Society, a faithful missonary, and the poor souls he sought to protect from Arab slavers. The costuming was great, right down to Livingstone's little blue "conductor's" cap and the motley pugaree on Stanley's pith helmet.
While the film de-demonizes Livingstone and Stanley so much that it would send any post-colonialist Cult-of-Achebe English prof into a pontificating hissy fit, it thoroughly develops Stanley's character, portraying him as a tormented soul and an indomitable survivor, partially through a series of flashbacks to his days as a Welsh [...] in a workhouse and his days as a Confederate soldier. In spite of Aidan Quinn's best efforts to overact the part in a few scenes. Fortunately, the casting of Nigel Hawthorne as old Doc Livingstone was pure genius. To paraphrase Troy McClure, "it was the part he was born to play, baby."
In a nutshell, Forbidden Territory is no Lawrence of Arabia, but it is a pretty good period piece guaranteed to delight anyone who has ever dreamed of battling tsetse flies and Somalis.
Not sure how real this was... I watched this movie, and was not sure if it was acurate or if it was another attempt to dissolve famous persons from the past. I was not pleased with the presentation and would not recommend this to my family or friends.
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