Duel in the Jungle

Interesting adventure in which Dana Andrews plays an insurance investigator who goes to Africa to check out the death by drowning of a man ( David Farrar ) who had a million dollar insurance policy. Also looking for info regarding the allegedly dead man is his wife, Jeanne Crain. Pretty fast paced drama, the last portion of the film set in the African jungle. Dana Andrews & Jeanne Crain were one of the great film pairings. Besides this film, they were also in State Fair, Madison Avenue, and Hot Rods to Hell. I had seen this film as a kid & it had kept me on the edge of my seat. It doesn't get much play these days--but I did find a DVD thru a collector. Seeing the film again was a thrill.

I would have never net a dime that this film, adventure flick, was directed by an American film maker, especially George Marshall; I woud have bet on Terence Young or even Jack Lee Thompson. I know, there is Dana Andrews here, because it is a co production, but the US touch is not that obvious. It remains however very entertaining and rather light hearted. I saw it a long time ago and totally forgot it. Not bad but far from being the best from this director who seemed to work in a so frantic pace, so many movies in his filmography confirm it. Good time waster taking place in Dark Africa, with some elements of thriller.

Reading here that an assistant director on this film was killed in the rapids no doubt filming the final action sequence of Duel In The Jungle, makes me wonder was it worth it. This poor man didn't exactly die for the making of Citizen Kane.

Duel In The Jungle finds Dana Andrews heading the cast of a British production where he's an insurance investigator sent to Africa to investigate the death of David Farrar, a rich adventurer on whom the company has written a million dollar policy. The company doesn't want to fork over that kind of loot without it's own investigation.

Andrews also devotes time to harassing and that's the only way you can describe it, Farrar's fiancé Jeanne Crain. That's all right because Farrar is a nasty villain.

The film was shot on location in South Africa and Rhodesia and good location shots were wasted on a rather predictable action/adventure film. It isn't The African Queen or King Solomon's Mines you'll be seeing with Duel In The Jungle.

Dana Andrews stars in this B-grade jungle adventure as an insurance investigator who teams up with the widow (Crain) of a diamond merchant (Farrar) who has apparently drowned after falling from a boat. Cautioned by native guide Vincent (Mataka) that his presence won't be welcome when they reach the village, Andrews persists in his doggedness to uncover the truth about Farrar's disappearance, and in his attempts to seduce the now nubile widow.

Assistant director Tony Kelly died making this picture, so it's of some comfort to know that it isn't a bad little pot-boiler, building some reasonable tension and punctuated with occasional light humour (the scene in which the chimp empties their luggage from the jeep is worth a chuckle). George Montgomery's look-a-like brother Dana Andrews is sturdy without being marvellous, and Farrar plays the obnoxious British git with aplomb.

Superimposing the actors over the white-water rapids backdrop, or in a confrontation with a menacing lion often looks clumsy, but this B-picture isn't staking any grand claims, just mild entertainment for afternoon channel-surfing.

Erwin Hillier's superb photography in Southern Africa, though not always successfully blended with stock footage, is the main asset of this production, one of several of its kind that were so popular in the Fifties, as well as on their British TV airings a decade later. Jeanne Crain and Dana Andrews are reunited a long way from State Fair, the latter an insurance investigator with an apparent freedom to go anywhere in the world at a moment's notice and who turns out to be a crack shot of Olympic standard, as of course one would. Ms Crain shows the ability of leading ladies of the era in this kind of movie to take whatever the jungle can throw at her without a mark on her clothing or a hair out of place, to say nothing of costume changes every five minutes or so. David Farrar plays the type of heel you certainly wouldn't want to go into the jungle with, though it's not easy to see why such an intelligent and resourceful man would go to the risks he does. The hero would now probably be up on a charge of stalking for the way he pursues Ms Crain in the first half, but it was Romance back then. Despite or even because of all the inconsistencies and incongruities I thoroughly enjoyed it.