For all it's based on a hunting expedition in the wide open spaces of Africa, this is actually rather a squalid little movie, based on a 1930's Hemingway short-story. Basically a three-hander, it stars Gregory Peck, Robert Preston and Joan Bennett in a love-triangle played out on safari. However even putting to one side the adulterous moral issue at the heart of the drama, it's actually quite difficult from today's viewpoint to have any respect, far less sympathy for any of the three of them considering they get their kicks from shooting defenceless creatures in the wild.
Peck is the experienced hunter-turned-guide charged with helping Preston's mega-rich Francis Macomber to bag a lion and / or a buffalo and in so doing convince his uncaring wife Bennett that inside he really is a big brave man and not the meek, shrinking violet he's been up till now. Personally I can think of dozens of other ways to do this without shooting a lion in the face but we're in Hemingway country and this is the test of masculinity in his world.
Anyway, when Preston then chickens out on an encounter with a charging lion, Bennett needs no more excuse to throw herself at the tall, handsome, fearless Peck's Wilson character. So can Macomber get his mojo back and win back his woman? Well, no he can't, because right at the start of the movie we know he's dead, apparently shot by his wife in an apparent "friendly fire" incident...or was it? In the extended flashback that follows the viewer is led to draw their own conclusions although the Production Code of the day naturally takes a hand in dictating just how we're meant to view the actions of a cheating wife.
There is as you'd expect, some good dialogue no doubt lifted from the original but like I said earlier, it's hard to care what happens to these people given their abominable hobby never mind the dismissive way they treat their native Kenyan helpers. The performances are good in the main but I wasn't convinced by the Peck / Bennett coupling, in fact it's a real surprise when he confesses his love for her to Macomber.
Not without some interest, this dated movie in the end gives out more reasons to dislike than like it and ultimately misses the target.
Peck is the experienced hunter-turned-guide charged with helping Preston's mega-rich Francis Macomber to bag a lion and / or a buffalo and in so doing convince his uncaring wife Bennett that inside he really is a big brave man and not the meek, shrinking violet he's been up till now. Personally I can think of dozens of other ways to do this without shooting a lion in the face but we're in Hemingway country and this is the test of masculinity in his world.
Anyway, when Preston then chickens out on an encounter with a charging lion, Bennett needs no more excuse to throw herself at the tall, handsome, fearless Peck's Wilson character. So can Macomber get his mojo back and win back his woman? Well, no he can't, because right at the start of the movie we know he's dead, apparently shot by his wife in an apparent "friendly fire" incident...or was it? In the extended flashback that follows the viewer is led to draw their own conclusions although the Production Code of the day naturally takes a hand in dictating just how we're meant to view the actions of a cheating wife.
There is as you'd expect, some good dialogue no doubt lifted from the original but like I said earlier, it's hard to care what happens to these people given their abominable hobby never mind the dismissive way they treat their native Kenyan helpers. The performances are good in the main but I wasn't convinced by the Peck / Bennett coupling, in fact it's a real surprise when he confesses his love for her to Macomber.
Not without some interest, this dated movie in the end gives out more reasons to dislike than like it and ultimately misses the target.