Modern Screen (Dec 1931 - Nov 1932 (assorted issues))

Two Against the Jungle them in hidden nests of two each. Suddenly there was a roar and a tremendous flare of light. The flash had gone off prematurely. Johnson was blinded, and the air reeked with the stink of burning flesh. As he grovelled on the ground in agony the boys, who had been frightened away by the explosion, came back. Together they carried him to the camp. His wife was out on the trail and there was no one in camp who had any knowledge of medicine. One of the boys tried to give him a sip of water, but his lips were so swollen that he could not swallow. His face was powder blackened, he hadn't a hair left on his head, and through burns m his clothes patches of seared flesh showed. For an eternity it seemed he lay groaning on his blankets. And then he heard footsteps outside. His wife had heard the rumble of the explosion m the distance and, becoming worried, had hastened back to the camp. She doctored him during the weeks that followed. Gradually his sight came back; the singed skin sloughed off, and m a month he was up and about as well as ever. THERE were many lions prowling around the lake, but Johnson got his best pictures of them while on safari far to the south on the Serengeti Plain. In the open country he traveled by automobile. One day he was out looking for lions in company with his wife and a gunbearer. As the car was creeping up the side of a little valley he sighted a grandmotherly old lioness watching them. She didn't seem angry at the intrusion, merely curious. At the approach of the car she got up leisurely and moved away, glancing from time to time over her shoulder, while Mrs. Johnson, who was at the wheel, followed at a discreet distance. At the top of the ridge a small herd of zebras were grazing and at sight of (Continued from page 97) the car they stampeded. The lioness turned and glared at the car, as though she suspected it of chasing an appetizing meal away. Martin motioned to the black boy to get the rifle ready in case she took it into her head to charge, for all members of the lion family are temperamental and their moods change in split seconds. But the lioness was not hungry enough to do more than glare. With regal dignity she turned and climbed an ant hill. There she crouched. It seemed to Johnson that she had posed herself for a picture. A professional photographer could not have placed her in a better position for light, height, or background. n "Let's see how close we_ can get, Johnson whispered to his wife. Slowly the car crept toward the ant hill for a few yards ; then it halted while Johnson cranked away. Time after time the car crept up closer and paused briefly while he ground out film. The old lioness held her place with a placid dignity. At last the front wheels were at the base of the ant hill, and Johnson switched to a two inch lens with the shortest focus he had. But the old girl just sat for her closeups with all the poise of a movie queen. Finally she got up slowly, stretched, yawned, and stalked away. Martin Johnson and Osa have taken many pictures of big game, in many places and under strange circumstances, but none gave them the thrill they got when the queen of the African plains posed for a closeup on the giant ant hill, then yawned, and walked off. AND now Martin Johnson has another unusual achievement to add to his record. On his last safari into the wilds of Central Africa, he went to the elaborate trouble and the immense expense of taking along equipment for the making of sound pictures of animals and natives. He is the first to make an all-sound film in Africa. The name of that new production is "Congorilla." And in my opinion it walks off with greatest honors. In fact the last three years were devoted to building up "Congorilla." From Nairobi across the Serengeti Plain the expedition journeyed with a motor caravan. One priceless shot is of wild dogs in action, another is of a wobbly baby giraffe hardly half an hour old. On the way to the Kaisoot Desert the way was blocked by a herd of rhinos. You see — and hear — Martin and Osa in action when the rhinos charge. But the high spot came when they took their sound equipment into the depths of the Belgian Congo, among the Little People, the pygmies. For the first time in all history we are able to visit the Ituri Forest and see and hear the pygmies. That part of the film is worth traveling a hundred miles to see. To reach the pygmy country the Johnsons had to travel deep into the gloomy recesses of Ituri. The village was so dark that decent pictures could not be obtained even with flares; so the whole tribe migrated to a lighter part of the forest. In the days that followed, the music, songs, and dances of the pygmies were recorded for the first time. And then for the climax to the expedition the Johnsons journeyed to the remote Alumbongo Mountains to try and find the "Giant Men," as the natives call them — the gorillas. On many occasions he had discussed the habits of the gorilla with Carl Akeley, who had made a life study of the greatest of apes. Now he was to attempt to film them and record sounds that are not to be heard anywhere else in the world — the woman-like screeches of the giant apes and, most amazing of all the drumming of the beasts as they beat their huge breasts in sudden bursts of anger. It's a truly remarkable achievement — this film of the unknown animal and human life of the Congo. Wake Up, Hollywood! writing them, ever since that time. When I wrote my first dog book ("Lad: A Dog"), I had to. peddle it far and wide before I could find a publisher for it. The publishers told me the public was not interested in dog-books and would not buy them. "Lad: A Dog" has run into sixty-odd editions and, after thirteen years, is still a steady seller. The public has compelled me to keep on, ever since, turning out successful dog-books. These personal instances can be of no interest to anyone but myself; 110 (Continued from page 37) except as they help to prove my point. And my point is that there is a mighty fortune awaiting the motion picture company which shall produce a really lifelike and dramatic and logical feature picture in which a dog is the chief character and in which the whole interest and action shall revolve about the dog; keeping the human characters subservient to him, as in all successful dog stories. Perhaps you don't agree with _ me. The publishers and the editors didn't agree with me, either. But they do, now. ' Some screen genius, one day, will launch such a picture — God knows when— and he will make a killing with it. Here you have your "human interest stuff" — your human emotion, if you prefer — and here you will have a truly great picture revolving wholly about that same emotion. It must be written and directed by someone who knows dogs as they really are and not as most writers and directors think they ought to be — and it must not only be plausible and logical and tell a real story; but it must depict the dog,