Timbuktu ** (1959, Victor Mature, Yvonne De Carlo, George Dolenz, John Dehner) – Classic Movie Review 7335

Esteemed director Jacques Tourneur’s 1959 romantic action adventure Timbuktu stars Victor Mature as American mercenary and gunrunner Mike Conway, who is mixed up in a forbidden romance with married Natalie Dufort (Yvonne De Carlo), upsetting her colonel husband Charles Dufort (George Dolenz), and with a rebellion plot in World War Two wartime French Sudan (it is 1940).

Conway (Mature) has been smuggling weapons to the Arabs, that is till Timbuktu commander Colonel Dufort’s wife Natalie (De Carlo) gets him to swap allegiances and he betrays the wicked Emir (John Dehner), aka The Lion of the Desert, to the French.

The potentially rewarding yarn gets wobbly treatment in all departments and the hesitant cast do not know what to do with the weak dialogue. It is an intriguing movie, but it ends up as not one of cult director Tourneur’s best works.

It is filmed in the California desert and at Kanab, Utah.

Also in the cast are Marcia Henderson, James Foxx, Paul Wexler, Leonard Mudie, Willard Sage, Mark Dana and Allan Pinson.

Timbuktu is directed by Jacques Tourneur, runs 91 minutes, is made by Edward Small Productions and Imperial, is released by United Artists, is written by Anthony Veiller and Paul Dudley, is shot in black and white by Maury Gertsman, is produced by Edward Small and is scored by Gerald Fried.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 7335

Check out more reviews on http://derekwinnert.com