She

If the 1935 SHE reminds you vaguely of the 1933 KING KONG do not be too surprised: both films were produced by Meriam C. Cooper, who endowed them with similar visual styles--and who tweaked the 1887 novel by H. Rider Haggard to create a similar story line as well. Starring Broadway actress (and later two term Democratic congresswoman from California) Helen Gahagan in her only film role as The Eternal One, SHE did not, however, meet with the same financial success. It lost a tremendous amount of money for RKO, was withdrawn, and for many years was thought to be completely lost.

Although the film alters the Haggard novel in a great many ways, it retains the basic elements. Lured by a family legend, Leo Vincey (Randolph Scott) braves the frozen European north with family friend Horace Holly (Nigel Bruce, best known for his appearances in the Sherlock Holmes series) and innocent Tanya Dugmore (Helen Mack, popular 1930s ingenue.) When an avalanche exposes a cavern, the three find that the Vincey family legend is not quite so fanciful after all.

Most particularly, they find themselves at the mercy of She Who Must Be Obeyed, a woman who recalls talk of Jesus Christ in the Jerusalem market place, a woman two thousand years old who preserves her life by bathing in a radioactive flame that vents from the volcanic floor of her hidden kingdom. She (known here as Queen Hash-A-Mo-Tep) has been waiting for the reincarnation of her long-dead love, and Leo is his spitting image.

The acting styles are stiff even by 1935 standards and although Miss Gahagan is attractive in a 1930s way she lacks the stunning beauty attributed to She by the Haggard novel--but the great draw of the film was never intended to be great acting: like KING KONG, it is an action-adventure film with knockout sets (a few of them actually lifted from KING KONG), memorable special effects, and remarkable cinematographic set pieces. Even as it borrowed from earlier films such as the 1932 Boris Karloff THE MUMMY, it would also influence later films in turn; it is hard, for example, to imagine the 1937 Ronald Coleman LOST HORIZON without it, and even the look of the evil queen in Disney's 1938 SNOW WHITE is said to have been inspired by Gahagan's look and performance.

The film has been released in several editions to the home market, and fans may be tempted by less expensive editions. A word to the wise: Don't. The film shows its age and there is no significant bonus material, but the Kino Video release (be it on VHS or DVD) offers what is probably the best print short of a digital restoration. Recommended for fans of 1930s fantasy cinema.

Gary F. Taylor, aka GFT, Amazon Reviewer

H. Rider Haggard's SHE was one of a number of late Victorian fantasy/romance novels I read when I was in high school back in the late 1960s. I ran across stills from a 1935 production of the story in a book about KING KONG which I'd purchased for my mother in 1976 (KONG was one of her favorite movies). T For many years it was thought that SHE had been lost in a vault fire, before being re-discovered by a film collector in Buster Keaton's garage. A staple of late night TV during the 1960s and 1970s, I never managed to see SHE until it surfaced in the early 1990s on VHS and DVD in 1999. Both formats were issued by Kino..

There is much of KING KONG in this production including the use of redecorated sets, a screenplay by Ruth Rose, and a throbbing Max Steiner score. This movie marks the culmination of producer Merian C. Cooper's forays into the exotic which began with his two remarkable silent documentaries GRASS (1925) and CHANG (1927) and progressed through THE MOST DANGEROUS GAME (1932) and KONG (1933). This time however, he was without his usual partner, director Ernest B. Schoedsack who was working on THE LAST DAYS OF POMPEII. It was also Cooper's most expensive production to date and a box office failure although the film was quite successful when re-released along with POMPEII in 1949.

The title role (originally envisioned for Greta Garbo) was enacted by Helen Gahagen, a Broadway actress, who brings a regal bearing to "She Who Must Be Obeyed" with her sonorous voice and solid presence, but she lacked the screen charisma Garbo would have brought. The initial failure of SHE effectively ended Gahagen's Hollywood career. Years later she would enter politics and oppose Richard Nixon in California. As the hero, Randolph Scott is handsome and heroic. A pre-Doctor Watson Nigel Bruce is at his best as Holly, and as Tanya, RKO contract player Helen Mack acts in her best on-screen role. Silent film actor Gustav von Seyfertitz gives a rare speaking performance as the High Priest. Samuel S. Hinds, James Stewart's dad in IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE, plays a small but important part in the film's prologue.

There are a number of similarities to Boris Karloff's 1932 film THE MUMMY. Both deal with ancient protagonists who await and encounter the reincarnations of their loved ones. There are scenes showing long-ago memories reflected in pools and the title characters have similar names. Karloff's mummy is Im-Ho-Tep while Galagher's She is Hash-A-No-Tep which is not her name in the book (it's Ayeesha). Both movies are leisurely paced but SHE is 30 minutes longer than MUMMY and had the advantage of a bigger budget. SHE contains some extraordinary set pieces such as the avalanche, the capture by the cave people, and the temple ceremony. The film, in turn, also influenced Walt Disney who patterned the look of the Wicked Queen in SNOW WHITE after Gahagan.

In 2007 Kino issued a Deluxe 2 disc edition with SHE as originally shown in movie theaters. In addition to the original black & white version, included is a colorized one supervised by Ray Harryhausen. Ray died in 2013 so he didn't have today's latest digital technology but I believe he'd still have preferred this muted color approach which resembles 19th century illustrations. Both the B&W and colorized versions are on Disc 1 with commentary by Harryhausen while Disc 2 has several interviews and other special features. An absolute must see, if only for the incredible Art Deco sets...For more reviews visit The Capsule Critic.

"She," adapted from H. Rider Haggard's timeless tale, has been produced multiple times, although never as entertainingly as the 1935 version, starring the imposing Helen Gahagan as She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed, the eternally beautiful ruler of the lost kingdom of Kor. This would be the only film appearance of Gahagan, a noted stage and opera star who later entered the political arena as Helen Gahagan Douglas. Reportedly, Gahagan was embarrassed by the movie and vowed never to heed Hollywood's call again. But perhaps she was her own severest critic, since "She" represents Depression Era escapism at its very peak.

The movie was produced by Merian C. Cooper, who'd struck it rich two years earlier with "King Kong." Those with sharp eyes will note that the enormous gate cutting Kor off from the outside world is the same one which served -- for awhile -- to hold Kong in his natural habitat on Skull Island. This outrageously opulent adventure tale stars the stoic Randolph Scott as American explorer John Vincey, who ventures into the Arctic to find the story behind a cryptic, 500-year-old letter. Accompanying him are the jolly Holly (Nigel Bruce, later to become a familiar face as Dr. Watson in the Nigel Rathbone "Sherlock Holmes" movies) and the feisty Tanya (Helen Mack), who's secretly attracted to John.

After surviving an avalanche and battling cave-dwelling cannibals, the intrepid trio comes face to face with a much greater danger, the imperious She, who has been bathing in a flame of eternal life and biding her time for centuries, looking for true love. "I am yesterday and today and tomorrow," She muses, shortly before deciding John is the man worth waiting half a millennium for. Tanya, however, has other ideas. Thrillingly scored by Max Steiner and featuring backdrops you won't believe (check out the patio of Holly and Tanya's apartment), the movie climaxes with a dazzling ceremony in the Hall of Kings, featuring hundreds of extras performing some of the most bizarre choreography ever filmed. That sequence alone would make the movie worthwhile, but it turns out to be only one of the many treasures of "She."

Anyone who loves epic music in pictures must see, or at least hear, this movie, which has little enough otherwise to recommend it other than its often striking visual inventiveness. It is, in a sense, the feminine flip side to "King Kong", and even shares certain thematic elements. My perspective is a bit unusual; I fell in love with the music when I was 16, years before I actually saw the film, by way of scratchy old transcription discs taped and distributed by the Max Steiner Music Society ages before "movie music" had won the respect it now enjoys. Steiner's score is in his most expressionistic mode, highly akin to "Kong" but more operatic; there is even a full-scale ballet in the last act! The music is a perfect accompaniment to Haggard's novel, of which I am also very fond despite its old-fashioned elements. I have this marvelous fantasy of a new remake, faithful to the book, with a new recording of Steiner's score! Alas, not too likely. Both the novel and the music are of an earlier age probably not commercial enough today. Helen Gahagan was actually an opera singer (years before becoming the famous "pink lady" of the Nixon campaign for California!) and her approach to the part is remote, perhaps more suited to a silent movie. Cinematographer Roy Hunt positively roasts the woman with light in an effort to give her an otherworldly quality. Randolph Scott and Helen Mack are both in way over their heads, although subsidiary actors like Samuel Hinds, Lumsden Hare, Noble Johnson and the immortal Gustav van Seyffertitz come off rather better. Nigel Bruce does his standard pompous British ass, which is a pity, as he was capable of much better. The decor is great fun: this is the palace of the Emperor Ming the Merciless' dreams, if only he'd had the budget! But the superb score overrides all else. It would probably not be appropriate for me to openly hawk CDs in this place, but the original soundtrack of this picture is available from Brigham Young University archive. Beg, borrow or steal it today! The ballet sequence is as powerful as anything in Stravinsky, and no higher praise is possible. A pity the movie is not equal to its soundtrack; but that's a problem Steiner ran into more than once in his career.

Story of a young man Leo Vincey who after hearing of his dying uncle tell the fantastic story of his ancestor 500 years ago, who found a lost kingdom and a pillar of eternal flame which resided with in, decides to go to the frozen north (in the original Haggard novel, it was East Africa), with his uncle's lab parter Horace Holly, a gold hungry guide, and the guide's daughter Tonya. When the guide is killed in an avalanche, it opens an entrance to the lost kingdom of Kor, where in resides the flame and it's keeper and kingdom ruler, Queen Hash-a-Mo-Tep, or She Who Must Be Obeyed. SHE believes Vincey to be her former lover of 500 years ago, who is also Vincey's ancestor. SHE later then tries to make sure that Vincey stay in the kingdom with her alone for eternity, even if it means the death of Tonya, whom Leo is really in love with. Very good picture with decent performances by the entire cast, but the acting couldn't overcome the melodramatic script, especially in Scott's case. Very good set design and art decoration by Polglase with the art-deco style of the 30's. Obviously not the equal of Cooper's prior masterpiece King Kong, but still a very well done piece and much better than the Andress version. Rating- 7.