Ingagi

A fascinating early part-fake documentary that I knew nothing about going in. For the first hour it appears to be made from authentic footage of an African expedition in the early 1920s with narration added, alongside some very obviously different footage, on very obviously different film stock, shot at a very obviously different location (the LA zoo, apparently) some years later.

It is only in the last 20 minutes that odd and obviously fantastical events start unfolding, firstly with the brief introduction of a half-armadillo, half-tortoise creature ("the tortadillo"), onscreen only for a few seconds, and then in the last 10 minutes a man in a gorilla costume abducting a villager with whom it is only vaguely implied he intends to mate. It's not dramatic or scary or entertaining at all, and then the film is over, with very much a whimper rather than a bang.

The accusation made by the other reviewer here of racism seems very much inflated: the narration referring to the African villagers encountered is simply an outsider's view of what must have seemed an extraordinarily foreign society: the remarks are friendly and lighthearted and for the time it was made, not racist at all. Having said that, the use at the end of black American actors playing African villagers does feel a little uncomfortable, but I guess it was necessary to maintain the continuity needed to complete the story they'd set out to make.

This isn't a good film by any means - the story is as flimsy as can be, and the premise preposterous, but the historical footage is interesting, and the nerve/ingenuity involved to actually try make the thing itself is to be admired, resulting as it did in perhaps the first film ever to really pull off a Blair Witch and Willow Creek-type found footage "horror" film.

"Ingagi" is a cheap exploitation film that apparently earned the filmmakers a TON of money. It's hard to imagine as you watch most of the movie because it is so very dull. However, near the end you see 'Ingagi'. The local tribe apparently engages in a weird system of bestiality by offering women to the gorillas! In the process, you see a bit of skin...and that probably was THE reason the film earned anything at all...as folks could say they were going to see an educational film when it actually was just a veil for nude women!

The film apparently made on the cheap...and much of it was faked. Some of the African animals are not African at all...such as armadillos and alligators from North America and the apes that had their way with the Ingagi women were Asian orangutans (though there's also a man in an ape suit in some scenes)! But it is much worse. Much of the footage was actually taken from an serious ethnographic film made many years before (hence it being a silent film apart from the narration) and the rest was faked. Many of the African animals were actually filmed in the L. A. Zoo! And those tiny pygmy people were just Black-American kids! I have no idea who the naked black women were and where they got that footage!

The bottom line is that this is a terrible, fake and yet incredibly boring movie. It is interesting to see so you can see how bad the film was...and yet it apparently fooled a lot of folks back in the day! It's also a prime example of an exploitational film at its worst....with not much to commend it.

Few early film documentaries came under severe criticism that their creators manipulated 'actors' to perform age-old customs no longer practiced. These documentaries examining distant cultures, called ethnographic films, were produced to show remote cultures whose people went through their daily lives that included old traditions and practices-but in actuality they had long abandoned them and had succumbed to modern conveniences.

The newly formed Congo Pictures took this manipulation to an entirely new level. Claiming to be a film document of a recent British expedition to the Belgian Congo, March 1930's "Ingagi" detailed several African tribes and the hunting forays they undertook to feed themselves. Towards its end, the producers revealed a strange ritual where tribal members selected one female to be sacrificed to the wild gorillas nearby. The drama is captured on film by a movie crew hidden in the jungle brush.

During "Ingagi's" California preview, a viewer recognized one of the "natives" on the screen. She knew the black actress from Central Casting and made her discovery public. Once the movie was released nationwide, others saw familiar footage from the 1915 film 'Heart of Africa,' made during Lady Grace MacKenzie's journey to the continent-the first white woman to organize an expedition into central Africa. The 15-year-old footage MacKenzie assembled appeared scratchy on the screen, while "Ingagi's" other scenes were crisp and clear. Even mammalogists in the audience questioned the 1930 expedition's discovery of a new breed of a venomous reptile: a "tortadillo." This strange animal was claimed to be a cross between a tortoise and an armadillo.

Further research pointed out the leader of this expedition, Sir Hubert Winstead of the Royal Geological Society, as well as an American sportsman, Captain Daniel Swayne, did not exist, nor was there any known journey of such an expedition from any organization was undertaken. Research also discovered there existed no word in any African language where "Ingagi" means gorilla, never mind the term meaning anything anywhere.

The Better Business Bureau stepped in to attempt to stop the widespread distribution of the RKO film. The Hays Office tried to stop "Ingagi's" distribution, but to no avail. Even the Federal Trade Commission began its own investigation into the movie and found out that much of the animals in the film were rented from the Selig Zoo, and were filmed in wooded areas nearby, including at Los Angeles' Griffith Park. "Ingagi" also contained scenes of supposed pygmies, who were really local children, five to ten years of age wearing make-up living in the L. A. area.

The controversial last 15 minute segment showing gorillas romping around with the native women was one of the movie's main selling points. It was later learned the head gorilla who takes the sacrificial woman was actually a man, Charles Gemora. He had appeared in 10 previous movies, including Lon Chaney's 1929 "Where East is East," wearing his convincing gorilla suit and acting like one.

In the end, despite a number of attempts to stop "Ingagi" from being shown, theaters showing it drew massive crowds, setting box office records. The adage that "there is no such thing as bad publicity" proved especially true in this mockumentary exploitation film, eventually grossing well-over $4 million for RKO Pictures. Such success gave other studios an incentive to produce a number of "gorilla-and-the-maiden films," including one classic by RKO, 1933's "King Kong."

Where do I start?

If you can make it through the senseless slaughter of animals--lions, rhinoceros, hippopotamus, elephant--all now endangered species thanks to the gratuitous big game hunting shown on screen, as well as the dull narration (there is no spoken dialogue in the entire film), at the end of this fake documentary comes the big let-down.

Billed as a horror film, the only horrors other than killing magnificent wild animals, is the implied human-ape sex and resulting hybrid humanoids shown in the last few minutes.

Perhaps this was more shocking 93 years ago than it is now, and this early talkie perhaps inspired better films, such as King Kong. But the real horror is watching big game hunters shooting animals for their entertainment and to entertain theater audiences.

THE STORY & GENRE CONTENT -- "Giant" gorilla worshiped by African tribe, "missing link" offspring. This is hoax "found-footage" stuff, which makes the genre part near the end laughable.

THE VERDICT -- You will root for this movie at the beginning, then hoot at the end... Regarding so-called "racism" here, there is none. They use young black kids for pygmies, but otherwise this is fairly respectful of people in general... I also had a hard time believing this was produced in 1930, probably because the picture clarity is so great, and but sad to say it plays like Ed Wood.

FREE ONLINE -- Yes, at 82 minutes (longer than listed 75 minutes), red tinted.