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.
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.