White Witch Doctor

Lonnie Douglas (Robert Mitchum) and his partner, Huysman (Walter Slezak), guide a dedicated nurse Ellen Burton (Susan Hayward) to the distant jungle outpost where she, as a volunteer, has been sent to give medical aid to the natives.. But Huysman and Lonni also have plans of their own: it is said that there is hidden gold in the Bakuba country, and they are determined to find it...

They penetrate the remote interior of the Belgian Congo by means of a primitive canoe propelled by a native crew... At one of their portages Ellen cures a native chief's wife (Dorothy Harris) and the witch doctor, seeking revenge for her interference, tries to kill her with a tarantula, but she manages to escape its poisonous bite...

Later, Lonni saves a boy who has been severely injured fighting a lion... The lad is the son of the Bakuba king and wears a necklace made of gold nuggets—the treasure Lonni and Huysman are seeking... Perhaps this is the opportunity they've been waiting for, Lonni thinks, and devises a plan for using the Bakuba boy to get the gold...

There have been quite a number of Adventurers ladies, the most notably adventurous of whom has perhaps been the aggressive and resilient Susan Hayward who was at her best not in the Oscar-Winning vein of 'I Want to Live,' but roughing it out in the jungle in films like 'White Witch Doctor.'

She was quite capable of blasting Jack Elam with a rifle at the end of 'Rawhide,' and in 'The Snows of Kilimanjaro,' she was tough enough to send the witch doctor packing and go to work with a knife on Gregory Peck who will otherwise die from the infection that was building up in him... Hayward was the great outdoor actress—indoors, she was often a bit too much to take...

This was Hayward's second movie with Robert Mitchum... They were teamed in Nicholas Ray's rodeo movie in 'The Lusty Men' (1952).

Africa was the real star of "White Witch Doctor," with beautiful color shots of the Congo and Bakubas caught in their colorful dances, taken by Leon Shamroy, three times an Oscar winner...

Lonni Douglas (Robert Mitchum) is a trapper working in Africa around the turn of the 20th Century. He captures large, exotic animals that he then sells to zoos around the world. His partner, Huysman (Walter Slezak), who is more the type to stay in the "office" and supervise, has an ulterior motive--he believes there is gold in "them thar" hills. So Douglas has been searching for the gold for years. There is only one place left to look--a remote area far up the Congo, inhabited by a tribe hostile to white men. When nurse Ellen Burton (Susan Hayward) arrives as an assistant for a doctor in a village neighboring the remote one, however, Huysman sees it as the perfect opportunity, with a benevolent "false front" presented to the tribes-people, for Douglas to take her up the Congo and search for the source of the gold.

Based on a novel by Louise A. Stinetorf, director Henry Hathaway and screenwriters Ivan Goff and Ben Roberts created a genre-spanning feast for the eyes, ears and mind in White Witch Doctor. The film combines adventure, suspense, romance, drama, intentional and unintentional humor, and an almost documentary-like travelogue through Africa.

The Technicolor cinematography is fantastic, and a great choice as we are treated to various African cultures in traditional dress, occasionally performing traditional dances and other ceremonies, throughout the film. I don't know a lot of background information on the film, but I would bet that some shots were filmed as documentary material in Africa. Possibly, some was stock footage.

But the heart of the film is Douglas, his relationship to Burton, and an often subtle, mostly subtextual commentary on a clash of cultures, which was far ahead of its time. Both Mitchum an Hayward are fabulous, with Mitchum occasionally approaching an enjoyable camp in his macho swagger and Hayward, in the context of the film and its characters, showing an also ahead-of-its-time underlying strength, intelligence and independence beneath her more stereotypical initial appearance as a beautiful but dependent woman. The script has an effective combination of serious drama with the difficulties of dealing with different cultures as well as a light playfulness.

This is a little-known gem of a film that deserves a serious first or second look. A 10 out of 10 from me.

Susan Hayward plays a missionary nurse sent to Africa to help a female doctor with a jungle hospital. Robert Mitchum is a wild game trapper and partner of Walter Slezak in seeking gold in the pre-World War I Belgian Congo. They escort her to the hospital as a pretext to search for gold rumored to be with a not very friendly tribe.

Politics is touched upon ever so briefly in this film. If it were made today the film would be a lot more explicit about the holocaust that was the Belgian Congo. Slezak makes a remark to Mitchum during the beginning of the film saying that they have to move fast since the Belgian government was taking over the running of the Congo. Just before World War I that is what happened. Up to that point the Congo colony was PRIVATELY run for King Leopold with no responsibility to anyone, but the king. Slezak's concern was that law and order was coming to the Congo.

The King had died around that time and reports about atrocities committed in the Congo by Leopold's hired help were shocking the civilized world. As well it should have been shocked. Torture, murder, maimings were routine occurrences. The report was put together by Roger Casement who later was executed for treason for his support of Irish freedom. The Bakuba tribe where this gold was allegedly from had real good reason to fear white folks at that time.

The American cinema had grown up post World War II as far as it's treatment of Africa. We Americans were a pathetically ignorant group about Africa and in many respects we still are. Our ideas about Africa came from Tarzan movies. But MGM gave us King Solomon's Mines and UA gave us The African Queen and we finally saw the real Africa.

The female missionary role was old hat by now. But Hayward is a nurse, not a psalm singer like Katharine Hepburn in The African Queen. Africa and the Belgian Congo in particular needed more of her kind and less of Hepburn's.

Mitchum is good as the cynical hero who is won over by the love of a good woman. Walter Slezak plays another of his patent brand of shrewd villains. Slezak was always good, and when he was a villain he was never a stupid one.

It's not as good as African Queen or Kings Solomon's Mines. Rates right up there with Mogambo though. Susan Hayward would return to Africa in Untamed and Mitchum would explore the jungle again in Mister Moses.

I wish the film could be done today with the politics more fully examined, but for the Fifties this was a step in the right direction.

Routine film dealing with the Congo of 1907 before Belgium took over.

The glamorous Susan Hayward comes there from America to be a nurse and help the missionary Dr. Mary. Problem is that Mary dies at Hayward's arrival time.

Robert Mitchum is a zoo keeper who is in partnership with a sinister Walter Slezak. Slezak wants to go upstream and get the gold there from the natives. That's where Hayward wants to get to so you know where the film is heading.

The film explores that Hayward is able to treat the chief's ailing son. Without joking, the chief looks like Spencer Willians (Andy Brown) of "Amos and Andy" fame on television.

Nice scenery with a routine plot and subplot. You know where this one is heading to very quickly. Nonetheless, Hayward and Mitchum do well together.

This is one of several adventure films produced by Hollywood and set in the African jungle made in the wake of KING SOLOMON’S MINES (1950). The narrative offers no surprises whatsoever – but the end result is nonetheless watchable thanks to the soft color, the star combo of Susan Hayward and Robert Mitchum (with Walter Slezak in support), and a notable score from the ever-reliable Bernard Herrmann.

Hayward was married to a doctor who died before embarking on a mission in Africa; so, being a qualified nurse in her own right, she determines to make his wish come true by going over there herself. When she arrives, the woman discovers that the current (female) medic had succumbed to an epidemic and, so, has to take over all by herself. An American guide/hunter (Mitchum) who also operates there as procurer of animals for international zoos - paving the way for the film's most exciting sequence when a gorilla springs out of its cage - is skeptical about whether she’ll be able to cope…but, naturally, Hayward’s a lot tougher than she at first appears – soon enough, ‘converting’ even the natives when her medicine proves more effective than the potions concocted by the local witch doctors (hence the title)! At one point, she’s called in to treat a chieftain’s son (after he’s attacked by a lion during his rite of passage) whose tribe had been the sworn enemy of the white people!

The latter emerges to be true once again when Slezak – for years involved in an undercover search for a lost treasure, which partner Mitchum is also aware of – and his men kill members of the tribe who try to oppose their path to the gold; Mitchum, no longer interested in the booty, faces off with Slezak while Hayward is held hostage by the tribe. It goes without saying that the happy ending sees the couple re-united and the chief’s son cured – with the tribe showing their gratitude at this by putting on an impromptu dance. Incidentally, there’s an excess of local color and native chatter – with which interpreter Mitchum seems uncomfortable – throughout the film…but, I guess, both these elements go with the territory!