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Bwana Devil is a 1952 drama written, directed, and produced by Arch Oboler. It is considered the first color, American 3-D feature. It started the 3-D boom in the US film making industry from 1952 to 1954. It stars Robert Stack, Barbara Britton, and Nigel Bruce. Image File history File links Metadata No higher resolution available. ...
Arch Oboler was a writer, producer, director active in both radio and television. ...
Arch Oboler was a writer, producer, director active in both radio and television. ...
Sidney W. Pink (March 16, 1916–October 12, 2002) was an American movie director and producer. ...
Arch Oboler was a writer, producer, director active in both radio and television. ...
Robert Langford Modini Stack (January 13, 1919 – May 14, 2003) was an American stage and movie actor. ...
Britton in They Made Me a Killer (1946) Barbara Britton (September 26, 1919 - January 17, 1980) was a film and television actress. ...
Nigel Bruce (left) with Basil Rathbone in a promotional photo for their Sherlock Holmes film series William Nigel Ernle Bruce (September 4, 1895 – October 8, 1953), usually credited as Nigel Bruce, was a British character actor, best known as Dr. Watson in a series of films and a radioseries starring...
Gordon Jenkins Gordon Hill Jenkins (12 May 1910-1 May 1984) was an American arranger who was an influential figure in popular music in the 1940s and 1950s, renowned for his lush string arrangements. ...
Joseph F. Biroc (February 12, 1903-September 7, 1996) was a highly successful film and television cinematographer. ...
The current United Artists logo (a variant was used during the 1980s). ...
Image File history File links This is a lossless scalable vector image. ...
is the 334th day of the year (335th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ...
Year 1952 (MCMLII) was a leap year starting on Tuesday (link will display full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ...
ISO 4217 Code USD User(s) the United States, the British Indian Ocean Territory,[1] the British Virgin Islands, East Timor, Ecuador, El Salvador, the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Palau, Panama, Turks and Caicos Islands, and the insular areas of the United States Inflation 2. ...
Year 1952 (MCMLII) was a leap year starting on Tuesday (link will display full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ...
A drama film is a film that depends mostly on in-depth character development, interaction, and highly emotional themes. ...
Arch Oboler was a writer, producer, director active in both radio and television. ...
In film, the term 3-D (or 3D) is used to describe any visual presentation system that attempts to maintain or recreate moving images of the third dimension, the illusion of depth as seen by the viewer. ...
Robert Langford Modini Stack (January 13, 1919 – May 14, 2003) was an American stage and movie actor. ...
Britton in They Made Me a Killer (1946) Barbara Britton (September 26, 1919 - January 17, 1980) was a film and television actress. ...
Nigel Bruce (left) with Basil Rathbone in a promotional photo for their Sherlock Holmes film series William Nigel Ernle Bruce (September 4, 1895 – October 8, 1953), usually credited as Nigel Bruce, was a British character actor, best known as Dr. Watson in a series of films and a radioseries starring...
The film's tagline was: The Miracle of the Age!!! A LION in your lap! A LOVER in your arms!
Plot
The film depicts the attacks by man-eating lions faced by the builders of the Uganda Railway. This article does not cite any references or sources. ...
The Uganda Railway is a railway system linking the interiors of Uganda and Kenya to the Indian Ocean at Mombasa in Kenya. ...
The time: the turn of the century. The place: British East Africa. Thousands of workers are building Africa's first railroad. Intense heat and sickness make it a formidable task. Two men in charge of the mission are Jack Hayward and Dr. Angus Ross. A pair of man-eating lions on the loose completely disrupt the undertaking. Hayward desperately attempts to overcome the situation but the slaughter continues. For other uses, see Lion (disambiguation). ...
Britain sends three big-game hunters to kill the lions. With them comes Jack's wife. After the game hunters are killed by the lions, Jack sets out once and for all to kill them. A grim battle between Jack and the lions endangers both Jack and his wife. Jack kills the lions and proves he is not a weakling.
Cast Robert Langford Modini Stack (January 13, 1919 – May 14, 2003) was an American stage and movie actor. ...
Nigel Bruce (left) with Basil Rathbone in a promotional photo for their Sherlock Holmes film series William Nigel Ernle Bruce (September 4, 1895 – October 8, 1953), usually credited as Nigel Bruce, was a British character actor, best known as Dr. Watson in a series of films and a radioseries starring...
Britton in They Made Me a Killer (1946) Barbara Britton (September 26, 1919 - January 17, 1980) was a film and television actress. ...
The revolution that nobody wanted
Billboard Advertising for "Bwana Devil" It was 1951 and theatre attendance had down-spiralled from 90 million in 1948 to 46 million a few years later. TV was the culprit and Hollywood was looking for a way to lure audiences back. Cinerama had premiered September 30, 1952 at the Broadway Theatre in New York and was packing them in but its bulky and expensive three camera system was impractical if not impossible to duplicate in all but the largest theatres. Image File history File links Metadata No higher resolution available. ...
Image File history File links Metadata No higher resolution available. ...
Cinerama is the trademarked name for a widescreen process which works by simultaneously projecting images from three synchronized 35 mm projectors onto a huge, deeply-curved screen, subtending 146° of arc, and for the corporation which was formed to market it. ...
One time screen writer Milton Gunzburg and brother Julian thought they had a solution with their Natural Vision 3-D film process. They shopped it around Hollywood with little or no interest. 20th Century Fox was focusing on the introduction of CinemaScope, and had no interest in another new process. Both Columbia and Paramount passed it up. Only John Arnold, who headed the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer camera department, was impressed enough to convince MGM to take an option on it but they quickly let the option lapse. This US Postage Stamp celebrates the 3-D movie craze of the 1950s. ...
Twentieth (20th) Century Fox Film Corporation (known from 1935 to 1985 as Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation) is one of the six major American film studios. ...
A Fox logo used to promote the CinemaScope process. ...
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American motion picture production and distribution company, based in Hollywood, California. ...
For alternate meanings of MGM, see MGM (disambiguation). ...
Natural Vision appeared to be dead and the Gunzburgs were back to square one until a meeting with Arch Oboler changed the history of films. Arch Oboler was a writer, producer, director active in both radio and television. ...
Production
publicity still for Bwana Devil Milton Gunzburg turned his focus to independent producers and demonstrated Natural Vision to Arch Oboler, producer and writer of radio's popular Lights out show, who was impressed enough to option it for his next film project, The Lions of Gulu. Oboler and co-producer Sid Pink scrapped 10 days of footage and started over using the Natural Vision process. Image File history File links Metadata No higher resolution available. ...
Image File history File links Metadata No higher resolution available. ...
Arch Oboler was a writer, producer, director active in both radio and television. ...
Wyllis Cooper Lights Out was an American old-time radio program featuring tales of the supernatural and the supernormal. ...
Sidney W. Pink (March 16, 1916–October 12, 2002) was an American movie director and producer. ...
The film was based on a well-known historical event, the killing of more than 120 workers building the Uganda Railway for the British at the turn of the century. The incident was also the basis for The Man-eaters of Tsavo, an adventure yarn written and published in 1907 by Lt. Col. J.H. Patterson, the Great White Hunter who dispatched the animals. This article does not cite any references or sources. ...
The Man-eaters of Tsavo is a book written by John Henry Patterson in 1907. ...
Lieutenant-Colonel John Henry Patterson, D.S.O. (1867-1947) was an Anglo-Irish soldier, hunter, and author, best known for his book The Man-Eaters of Tsavo. ...
The Paramount Ranch, now located in The Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, sat in for an African savanna. There is a now a hiking trail in the area named "The Bwana Trail" to denote the locations used in Bwana Devil. A movie ranch is a ranch that is at least partially dedicated to being used as a site for the production of motion pictures. ...
The Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area is a U.S. National Recreation Area, administered by the National Park Service, located in Los Angeles. ...
“Savannah†redirects here. ...
Authentic Africa footage previously lensed by Arch Oboler in 1948 (in 2-D) was incorporated into the film. Ansco color film was used instead of the more expensive and cumbersome Technicolor process.
The film premiered under the banner of "Arch Oboler Productions" On November 26, 1952 at the Paramount Theatres in Hollywood and Los Angeles. The film was a critical failure but a runaway success with audiences. Premieres followed in San Francisco on December 13, Philadelphia, Dallas, Houston and San Antonio openings on December 25 and New York on February 18, 1953.
United Artists bought the rights to Bwana Devil from "Arch Oboler Productions" for $500,000 and a share of the profits and began a wide release of the film in March as a "United Artists" film. A lawsuit followed, in which producer Edward L. Alperson Jr. claimed that he was part owner in the film after purchasing a part of it for $1 Million USD. The courts decided in Oboler's favor, as Alperson's claim was unsubstantiated and "under the table." The current United Artists logo (a variant was used during the 1980s). ...
The other major studios wiped the egg off of their faces and began a scramble to release their own 3-D films. Warner Brothers optioned the Natural Vision process for House of Wax. It premiered on April 10, 1953 and was ballyhooed as "the first 3-D release by a major studio". In truth, Columbia had trumped them by two days with their release of Man in the Dark on April 8, 1953. Warner Bros. ...
House of Wax can refer to: House of Wax, a 1953 3D horror film starring Vincent Price. ...
Man in the Dark is a film noir drama 3-D film starring Edmund OBrien, Audrey Totter and Ted de Corsica released in 1953. ...
Reviews - Bosley Crowther of the New York Times said it was "a clumsy try at an African adventure film, photographed in very poor color in what appear to be the California hills".
- Variety summed up the process: "This novelty feature boasts of being the first full-length film in Natural Vision 3-D. Although adding backsides to usually flat actors and depth to landscapes, the 3-D technique still needs further technical advances."
- Time magazine called it a "dog".
- Hollis Alpert of The Saturday Review wrote, “It is the worst movie in my rather faltering memory, and my hangover from it was so painful that I immediately went to see a two-dimensional movie for relief. The polarization process darkened the image so that everything seems to be happening in late afternoon on a cloudy day. Nigel Bruce will either loom up before you or look like a puppet.
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