When flicking TV channels I came across this film on Talking Pictures 15 minutes after it had started. I was sufficiently intrigued to record the remainder and then "catch up" with the start on TPTV Encore.
I found it adequate enough, though here and there I wondered if there'd been some editing before it was shown on Talking Pictures, with several jumps in the plot. These became more obvious when the action moved to South Africa, with a few scenes back in London, with communication between the two being rapid, one letter to the British Government taking just weeks to arrive. More like three months was the norm! And after they'd swum ashore the five seemed to have found some more clothes.
It was refreshing that the female lead, Louisa, was NOT portrayed as glamorous; in fact when I first saw her during the channel-flicking I wondered if she was a boy. Decades ago, Hollywood would have used a glamorous actress to play a female convict. Think Paulette Goddard in "Unconquered". (Gabriella Cirillo herself could be glamorous, to the extent of winning the Miss Italy title in South Africa a few years later.)
But if the producers avoided this trope, there were others that they did not. There were the traditional encounters with South African wildlife; after the lion, rhinoceros and elephants had appeared, I was thinking "snake next", and so it proved. And there were the immediate romances when the five reached the hospitable estate.
All the cast acquitted themselves well enough, but the vindictive Major Watson seemed rather callow for his rank. Better for him to have been a lieutenant or played by an older actor.
The ending caught me unawares. It was as if the makers had exceeded their screen time and rushed the closing scenes. And how did Mrs Tusco fare when she arrived in the vastness of South Africa to re-unite with her husband?
