Production
Many accidents occurred during filming in Africa. Many of the crew, including the director, contracted malaria. An African crewman fell into a river and was eaten by a crocodile. Another was killed by a charging rhino (which was captured on film and used in the movie). Swarms of insects, including locusts and tse-tse fly, were common.
Female lead Edwina Booth became infected, probably with malaria, during filming. It took six years for her to fully recover from this and other conditions she endured. She retired from acting soon after and sued MGM, which settled out of court.
A sound crew, sent half way through filming, were unable to produce good quality work. This resulted in most of the dialogue sequences being reshot at MGM's Culver City Studio. This caused rumours that the entire production had been filmed there, so most of this footage was cut from the final release. Many animal scenes were filmed in Tecate, Mexico by a second unit to avoid the American laws on the ethical treatment of animals. For example, lions were reportedly starved to promote vicious attacks on hyenas, monkeys and deer.
The actual 'White Hunter' in the film was Lt. Col. W.V.D. Dickinson ("Dicker") OBE MC.
Read more about this topic: Trader Horn (1931 film)
Famous quotes containing the word production:
“I really know nothing more criminal, more mean, and more ridiculous than lying. It is the production either of malice, cowardice, or vanity; and generally misses of its aim in every one of these views; for lies are always detected, sooner or later.”
—Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl Chesterfield (1694–1773)
“... if the production of any commodity necessitates the sacrifice of human life, society should do without that commodity, but it can not do without that life.”
—Emma Goldman (1869–1940)
“Constant revolutionizing of production ... distinguish the bourgeois epoch from all earlier ones. All fixed, fast-frozen relations, with their train of ancient and venerable prejudices are swept away, all new-formed ones become antiquated before they can ossify. All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses, his real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind.”
—Karl Marx (1818–1883)