Jungle Hell

Sabu like so many Hollywood stars was looking toward television as his career salvation. Jungle Hell is patchwork type of feature film edited from some episodes of an unreleased television series.

Possibly had we seen the full episodes they might have been entertaining enough. Judging from what I have seen the series was no better or worse than say Sheena or Ramar Of The Jungle. Television was a tad slow in catching on to public tastes. They were still making stories in a Hollywood like jungle when filmgoers were seeing the real deal starting with The African Queen and King Solomon's Mines.

Sabu plays Sabu an eager young lad who wants to learn the ways of the west to help his people. Doctors David Bruce and later K.T. Stevens are interested in a 'burning rock' that the natives venerate. In the 50s no need to spell out radioactivity. White hunter George E. Stone has some nefarious purposes of his own for the rock and others like it.

The episodes were cobbled together so you have to fill in a lot with your imagination. Might have made an interesting TV series though as this was shot in Sabu's native Mysore and the footage of the village life was the best part of the film.

I've watched this movie 3 times today and didn't see one UFO. This was a double feature DVD with Savage Drums and Jungle Hell. The movie action opens with the village healer trying to heal the sick son (played by Paul Dastagir - Sabu's son). I think this must be a cut version where they decided the UFO stuff was just too weird and chopped it out. This simplifies the plot as it just becomes some natives getting burned by radioactive rocks the elephants uproot while knocking down trees and their reluctance to defy the village healer and go to the scientist for a real cure which apparently consists of a salve probably from Walgreens over on the radiation sickness aisle.