Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

Memorable, crazy movie

Boring

If you like to be scared, if you like to laugh, and if you like to learn a thing or two at the movies, this absolutely cannot be missed.

Reporter/explorer Stanley's famous trek to the heart of Africa to find the missing missionary Doctor Livingstone is one of the most famous and epic stories to come out of the Victorian era. This film captures the significance of that event, although a few facts get in the way of the narrative. Spencer Tracy (at his best) is Stanley and he gives one of his greatest performances. Unbelievable as it may seem, he's nearly upstaged by Sir Cedric Hardwicke's portrayal of Doctor Livingstone, even though that actor's screen time is limited to twenty minutes. Hardwicke captures Livingstone's eccentricities and religious fervor perfectly without turning him into a caricature. The scene where he leads his native charges in a rousing songfest ("Onward Christian Soldiers") is nearly the highlight of the film. The pivotal meeting of the two men where Stanley utters the famous line "Doctor Livingston, I presume?" has the correct dramatic buildup and is handled with dignity and enough gravitas to satisfy most historians. Tracy's fiery speech at the Society of Geographers back in England after his discovery is also a key moment in the film and nearly worth the price of admission. The film is directed with competency and some verve by Henry King. Unfortunately, many of the African countryside scenes were left over from previous films and they're incorporated rather clumsily into this movie. The performances are uniformly excellent, however, especially the two men of the title. Also around is Richard Greene as a malaria-stricken explorer and beautiful Nancy Kelly as his fiancé. Tracy's character is also smitten with her and that angle of the story is irrelevant and completely unnecessary. Walter Brennan, as one of Tracy's American colleagues, comes aboard for the safari but his brand of Old West comic relief falls flat---even with the natives. Charles Coburn, as the ruthless Lord Tyce, is the designated villain of the piece, but he changes colors in the final reel and gets a nice hug from his daughter (Ms. Kelly). As Stanley marches off to uncover more of the mysteries of the "Dark Continent," viewers are left with the feeling that he's now emulating the same type of messianic mission as Doctor Livingstone. But that's not what actually happened. In reality, Stanley became a "hired gun" for expanding colonialists and was involved in more than his share of "safaris gone bad." He had plenty of blood on his hands by the time he called it quits. That unpleasant fact didn't prevent Queen Victoria from knighting him late in his life. As they say, no one's perfect.

Spencer Tracy is Henry Stanley, whose editor at the New York Herald, sends him to Africa to seek out the lost figure of Dr. Livingtone, missionary, who is somewhere out there on the veldt if he's not dead. Others have tried before and come back broken men. Nancy Kelly is in there to issue dark warnings and provide something resembling a romantic interest that proves Stanley is heterosexual.Stanley succeeds. After much travail, after stumbling through vast wastelands where the hand of man has never set foot, he and his comic sidekick and his native bearers stumble into a remote village and find the amazed Dr. Livingstone, who looks exactly like Sir Cedric Hardwicke. The ragged, exhausted Stanley stares wide eyed, gulps, and asks hesitantly, "Say, where's the nearest toilet?" No, that's not it. I'm afraid I wasn't taking notes. "Can a fella get a cold beer around here?" That can't be right either. "One small step for a man?" Well, it will come to me.In any case, Livingstone, having found his bliss, refuses to leave. There's too much work for him here. Stanley is a little surprised and disappointed but no matter, he has his story. The problem is that no one back home believes him and he's denounced roundly by all the pompous authority figures. The climactic existential act is fictitious.You must enjoy these old black-and-white biographies and historical pieces from the 30s. There's nothing to dislike. The pretense at historical accuracy is always perfunctory. There's no confusion, no ambiguity. A man has found his Calvinist calling and if he misbehaves a little along the way to his goal, why he shapes up properly before the end. (He'd better -- or else.) Spencer Tracy is always reliable. His face has the magnetic appeal of a hard-boiled egg yet he never really steps wrong in any role. He's an easy guy to identify with because he looks so exceptionally ordinary. But he could have used a sidekick with funnier lines. I suppose the audiences, somewhere, were supposed to be amused by Walter Brennan's old Injun fighter, but it strikes us today as corny beyond belief. In Africa, he complains, "These folks don't know nothing about flapjacks and sour belly." And he's disgruntled to find that the Red Sea is the same color as any other ocean. It's hard to tell who the writers were aiming at. Still, there may be some residual educational value in the film. I wonder how many high school kids today could identify Stanley or Livingstone. Not as many as we might like to think, since neither the figures nor their story have had any impact on anyone's body sheath. God forbid that we ask about Sir Richard Burton the First. Mungo Park might be identified as a national monument in Georgia.That reminds me. The BBC produced a superb miniseries, "The Search For the Nile", in 1971 that gave a more accurate picture of Henry and Livingstone, but I don't think it's available.

Stanley and Livingstone is maybe not the most accurate historical movie presented,but nevertheless a very interesting experience. Spencer Tracy is very good in this one,portraying his character in the naturalistic style he was famed for.Cedric Hardwicke is Dr. Livingstone conveying the concern and love for humanity as a dedicated missionary would have.The treatment of the Africans in this movie would feel very racist today,but I think the attitudes of white supremacy was very true to life since this movie is set in the 1870's. Walter Brennan's comic supporting part is a bit annoying and Charles Coburn's British newspaper editor is a caricature.The African footage is spectacular,especially the native attack on Stanley's caravan. This movie is also crying out for a DVD release

David Livingston was the greatest Scottish/British missionary of the 19th Century, in helping to spread Christianity in Africa. He also did what he could to make an end of the slave trade in Africa. Finally, a typical Victorian with insatiable curiosity, he explored much of central Africa, discovering Lake Nyasa (the third largest lake on the continent) and striving to find the source of the Nile (he mistakenly believed in an ancient story that it was a set of huge fountains in central Africa). In 1870 rumors started to spread that Livingston (who had not been heard of for several years) was dead. Probably, in the back of his contemporaries minds, were memories of the death of Sir John Franklin in 1847, while searching for the Northwest Passage. Franklin's two ships of men died of exposure and starvation, but their fate was not fully discovered until 1859. For years it was believed some of the men might still be alive. So it was reversed in Livingston's case - the worst was feared for the missionary. Enter an American publisher of vision - James Gordon Bennett Jr. The son of a Scottish immigrant who created America's first successful daily newspaper, the New York Herald, Gordon Bennett had a scandalous and colorful career in the U.S., and finally decided to go to Paris and create a European counterpart to his American paper. He built better than he knew. The New York Herald is no longer in existence, even after it absorbed it's rival the New York Tribune to become the Herald - Tribune (the New York paper died in 1966 after a major newspaper strike). The Paris Herald - Tribune still flourishes to this day. Gordon-Bennett Jr. was full of good ideas. He promoted ballooning and aviation (a Gordon-Bennett prize was given to balloonists for many decades).He loved scoops. In 1871 he decided that he should subsidize a reporter to try to locate the fate of Livingston. He found a useful American reporter in Henry Stanley. He summoned Stanley to Paris.Stanley's real name was John Rowland. He was English born, but had immigrated to America as a poor boy, went into the south, worked on a plantation and was adopted by it's owner. He adopted that man's last name (Stanley). In the American Civil War he fought as a Confederate, but deserted, then joined the Federal Navy and saw the end of the war as a Union sailor. He drifted into reporting for the New York Herald, which was how he came to Gordon-Bennett's ken.In choosing Stanley Gordon-Bennett made a brilliant decision. The reporter had brains and determination, and he pushed through with his expedition. Finally, in October 1871, Stanley found David Livingston and made his immortal greeting "Dr. Livingston, I presume?" He stayed with Livingston for a few weeks, and then returned to England. Despite great proof that he had found the Doctor, many people did not choose to believe Stanley. Then proof from Africa came verifying it, unfortunately it came with news that Livingston had died (in 1873). Livingston's body was returned to England - his heart was carefully removed and buried in Africa.Now considered a "blooded" African traveler and writer, Stanley decided to enter the field of exploration. He returned several times to Africa, and would finally settle the issues of Lake Victoria (see THE MOUNTAINS OF THE MOON review), and Lake Tanganyika. His four treks through the African continent made Stanley the greatest of the African explorers.But explorers, especially newspapermen, need to make a living. Enter King Leopold II of Belgium. One of the smartest monarchs of his day, Leopold managed to connive himself into the position of being owner (not monarch, but owner) of the territories that would be called the CONGO (a larger area than the nation of the Congo today). Leopold wanted the natives to be "pacified" before exploiting them as a work force to milk resources in the territories. Stanley was all too willing to be such. He earned his income - a large income. The natives were beaten, tortured, killed by Stanley and his forces of mercenaries. The Congo was organized into a mock-political colony, but in reality it was a slave labor camp that made Leopold one of the richest men in the world. It's capital would be called Leopoldville, and it's second city (with becoming grace) Stanleyville. Few in the 19th Century noticed what was happening. One was the Italian African Explorer Brazza, who tried to stop some of the atrocities and bring them to world attention. He did not succeed in the latter (Leopold was a master at killing bad news items), but a town was built in the Congo named for him - Brazzaville. Stanley remained a British national hero until his death in 1904. That year Leopold found that the bad news finally came out - two British diplomats in the Congo, Edward Morell and Roger Casement, published documents and photographs of the atrocities. Leopold was forced to give up the personal ownership of the territories (which became the Belgium Congo). Eventually the colony was broken up into several independent countries (after long, bloody civil wars). Their current governments are not the greatest examples of democracy. But there is a universal dislike in their citizens towards the memories of Leopold and his tool. Leopoldville and Stanleyville are no longer named for them. However Brazzaville retains it's name to this day.Spencer Tracy performance as the explorer is a good one, as is Cedric Hardwicke's as the missionary. Henry Hull is a good Gordon-Bennett (though not as colorful a newspaper editor as his great turn in JESSE JAMES and THE RETURN OF FRANK JAMES). But the film is trying to tell the story on a high tone level. It properly shows the great man Livingston was, but it makes the self-centered Stanley look like he's convinced into bringing Livingston's Christian message to Africa. The real Stanley would have given lip-service to Livingston's ideals, and then pocketed his blood money from Leopold.