Rhodes of Africa ** (1936, Walter Huston, Oskar Homolka, Basil Sydney, Peggy Ashcroft) – Classic Movie Review 10,529

Director Berthold Viertel’s 1936 British black and white biopic Rhodes of Africa [Rhodes] is a portrait of Cecil Rhodes, diamond and gold miner, British Empire builder and the father of Rhodesia, made at the time when the British still had an Empire.

Rhodes of Africa [Rhodes] is a competent and fairly complete picture of the extraordinary statesman and colonist, whose reputation is of course clearly somewhat tarnished today.

In a notable performance, Walter Huston plays Rhodes as an ambitious adventurer, Peggy Ashcroft stands out as the amicable journalist Anna Carpenter, Basil Sydney plays Dr Jim Jameson, and Oscar Homolka and Renee De Vaux help too as Paul and Mrs Kruger.

The film lags when it attempts to be too slavish to the details of events and, perhaps inevitably, finds itself struggling with the difficult task of turning a long and complex historical story into a successful film drama running only 90 minutes.

It is filmed at Gainsborough Studios, Shepherd’s Bush, London, by Gaumont British Picture Corporation, who were aiming at the American market but getting themselves into considerable financial trouble. There are also South Africa exteriors, directed by producer Geoffrey Barkas.

Also in the cast are Frank Cellier, Bernard Lee, Renee De Vaux, Lewis Casson, Ndaniso Kumala, Glennis Lorimer, Felix Aylmer and Percy Parsons.

The current Commonwealth of Nations was formally constituted by the London Declaration in 1949, which modernised the community and established the member states as ‘free and equal’. The Commonwealth is a political association of 54 member states, nearly all former territories of the British Empire.

Rhodes of Africa [Rhodes] is directed by Berthold Viertel and Geoffrey Barkas (South Africa exteriors), runs 90 minutes, is made by Gaumont British Picture Corporation, is released by Gaumont British Distributors (1936) (UK) and Gaumont British Picture Corporation of America (1936) (US), is written by Michael Barringer (adaptation), Leslie Arliss (adaptation), Miles Malleson (dialogue) and Sarah Gertrude Millin (book), is shot in black and white by Bernard Knowles and S R Bonnett, is produced by Geoffrey Barkas, is scored by Louis Levy (musical director) and Hubert Bath, and is designed by Oscar Friedrich Werndorff.

© Derek Winnert 2020 Classic Movie Review 10,529

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