''King Solomon's Mines'' is a 1937 British

adventure film The adventure film is a broad genre of film. Some early genre studies found it no different than the Western film or argued that adventure could encompass all Hollywood genres. Commonality was found among historians Brian Taves and Ian Cameron in ...

directed by Robert Stevenson and starring

Paul Robeson Paul Leroy Robeson ( ; April 9, 1898 – January 23, 1976) was an American bass-baritone concert artist, actor, professional American football, football player, and activist who became famous both for his cultural accomplishments and for h ...

Cedric Hardwicke Sir Cedric Webster Hardwicke (19 February 1893 – 6 August 1964) was an English stage and film actor whose career spanned over 50 years. His theatre work included notable performances in productions of the plays of Shakespeare and Shaw, and hi ...

, Anna Lee, John Loder and Roland Young. A film adaptation of the 1885 novel of the same name by Henry Rider Haggard, the film was produced by the Gaumont British Picture Corporation at Lime Grove Studios in

Shepherd's Bush Shepherd's Bush is a suburb of West London, England, within the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham west of Charing Cross, and identified as a major metropolitan centre in the London Plan. Although primarily residential in character, its ...

. Sets were designed by

art director Art director is a title for a variety of similar job functions in theater, advertising, marketing, publishing, fashion, live-action and animated film and television, the Internet, and video games. It is the charge of a sole art director to supe ...

Alfred Junge Alfred Junge (29 January 1886, Görlitz, Silesia (now Saxony), Germany – 16 July 1964, Bad Kissingen, West Germany) was a German production designer who spent a large part of his career working in the British film industry. Biography Jung ...

. Of all the novel's adaptations, this film is considered to be the most faithful to the book.

Plot

In 1882, Irish dream chaser Patrick "Patsy" O'Brien and his daughter Kathy have failed to strike it rich in the diamond mines of

Kimberley Kimberly or Kimberley may refer to: Places and historical events Australia Queensland * Kimberley, Queensland, a coastal locality in the Shire of Douglas South Australia * County of Kimberley, a cadastral unit in South Australia Ta ...

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

(then the

Cape Colony The Cape Colony (), also known as the Cape of Good Hope, was a British Empire, British colony in present-day South Africa named after the Cape of Good Hope. It existed from 1795 to 1802, and again from 1806 to 1910, when it united with three ...

). They persuade a reluctant Allan Quartermain to drive them to the coast in his wagon. Along the way, they encounter another wagon carrying two men in bad shape. Umbopa recovers, but Silvestra Getto dies after boasting to Quartermain that he has found the way to the fabled mines of

Solomon Solomon (), also called Jedidiah, was the fourth monarch of the Kingdom of Israel (united monarchy), Kingdom of Israel and Judah, according to the Hebrew Bible. The successor of his father David, he is described as having been the penultimate ...

. Patsy finds the dead man's map and sneaks off during the night, unwilling to risk his daughter's life. Kathy is unable to persuade Quartermain to follow him; instead, they rendezvous with Quartermain's new clients, Sir Henry Curtis and retired naval commander John Good, who are hunting for big game. Kathy steals Quartermain's wagon to pursue her father. When they catch up with her, she refuses to return with them, so they and Umbopa accompany her across the desert and over the mountains shown on the map. During the arduous trek, Curtis and Kathy fall in love. On the other side of the mountains, they are surrounded by unfriendly natives and taken to the

kraal Kraal (also spelled ''craal'' or ''kraul'') is an Afrikaans and Dutch language, Dutch word, also used in South African English, for an pen (enclosure), enclosure for cattle or other livestock, located within a Southern African Human settlement ...

of their chief Twala to be questioned. Twala takes them to see the entrance of the mines that are guarded by the feared

witch doctor A witch doctor (also spelled witch-doctor), or witchcraft doctor, is a kind of magical healer who treats ailments believed to be caused by witchcraft. The term is often misunderstood, and they could more accurately be called "anti-witch doctors ...

Gagool. That night, Umbopa reveals that he is the son of the former chief who was treacherously killed by the usurper Twala. He meets with dissidents, led by Infadoos, who are fed up with Twala's cruel reign. Together, they plot an uprising for the next day during the ceremony of the "smelling out of the evildoers." However, Umbopa needs Quartermain to devise a plan that the natives think will counter Gagool's magic. During the rite, Gagool chooses several natives who are killed on the spot. Recalling having made a bet on the previous year's Derby Day, Good notices in his diary that there will be a total

solar eclipse A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun, thereby obscuring the view of the Sun from a small part of Earth, totally or partially. Such an alignment occurs approximately every six months, during the eclipse season i ...

that day at exactly 11:15 a.m. The quick-thinking Quartermain predicts the eclipse as Gagool approaches Umbopa. Umbopa reveals his true identity to the people during the height of the eclipse and the rebellion erupts. Both sides gather their forces, and during the ensuing battle, Curtis kills Twala, ending the civil war. In the fighting, Kathy slips away to the mine to look for her father. She finds him inside, immobilized by a broken leg but clutching a pouch full of diamonds. Quartermain, Curtis and Good follow her, but Gagool sets off a rockfall to seal them in. Inside they learn that the mine is connected to a

volcano A volcano is commonly defined as a vent or fissure in the crust of a planetary-mass object, such as Earth, that allows hot lava, volcanic ash, and gases to escape from a magma chamber below the surface. On Earth, volcanoes are most oft ...

which had led the mine to be sealed up long ago. Umbopa pursues Gagool back into the mine, where the witch doctor is crushed by falling rocks. The new chief manages to free his friends as the volcano was about to erupt and gives them an escort to help them cross the desert.

Cast

as Umbopa *

as Allan Quartermain * Roland Young as Commander John Good * John Loder as Sir Henry Curtis * Anna Lee as Kathy O'Brien * Arthur Sinclair as Patsy O'Brien * Robert Adams as Twala * Arthur Goullet as Sylvestra Getto * Ecce Homo Toto as Infadoos * Makubalo Hlubi as Kapse * Mjujwa as Scragga * Sydney Fairbrother as Gagool (uncredited) *

Frederick Leister Frederick Leister (1 December 1885 – 24 August 1970), was an English actor. He began his career in musical comedy and after serving in the First World War he played character roles in modern West End plays and in classic drama. He appeared in ...

as Diamond Buyer (uncredited)

Production

Gaumont-British The Gaumont-British Picture Corporation was a British company that produced and distributed films and operated a cinema chain in the United Kingdom. It was established as an offshoot of France's Gaumont (company), Gaumont. Film production Gaumo ...

announced the film in 1935 and

was signed in 1936. Filming began in

, London in November 1936, and the unit then travelled to Africa for a further eight weeks of work. Charles Bennett is credited as one of the writers, but he claimed that he "didn't really" contribute to the screenplay. He said that he was opposed to the idea of a woman going along on the trip ("it was a damn silly idea") and took himself off the project.

Reception

Writing for '' Night and Day'' in 1937,

Graham Greene Henry Graham Greene (2 October 1904 – 3 April 1991) was an English writer and journalist regarded by many as one of the leading novelists of the 20th century. Combining literary acclaim with widespread popularity, Greene acquired a re ...

gave the film a neutral review, summarizing it as "a 'seeable' picture." Greene praised the acting of Hardwicke and Young as well as the clever dovetailing of scenes from Geoffrey Barkas' documentary, but he disliked the performances by Loder and Robeson and yearned for Lucoque's 1919 black-and-white version, which he felt was more faithful to Haggard's original 1885 book. (reprinted in: )

References

External links