Mountains of the Moon (1990)

Purely Joyful Movie!

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

This tale's uniquely distinctive feature is its vivid portrayal of the life and environment of the natives and other tribes inhabiting, or trading in, central Africa during the 19th century.The film was shot by Roger Deakins, who has been nominated thirteen times for an Academy Award for his cinematography, and amazingly has never won. He must be the greatest living exponent of his art. He also had unusual early experience of filming African landscapes.This treatment of the story of Burton and Speke, and their search for the source of the Nile river, has left several viewers, including me, avidly wanting to know more about their relationship, whether Speke committed suicide in 1864, and the fundamental reasons for their apparent falling out. On balance, Burton is presented here as the wronged party, but other factual accounts seem to me to tend to favour Speke, because of Burton's difficult and eccentric personality. His wife, Isabel, was exceptionally devoted, and she is played here by Fiona Shaw, who resembles her strongly in appearance.There is little doubt that Burton was the more remarkable human being of the two, but the question remains open, and it appears that the credit for actually first establishing the source of the Nile must go to Speke. It was ultimately firmly confirmed by Stanley.There is a conflict between Speke's obsessive Victorian imperialism, and Burton's equally obsessive but more academic interest in the world's varieties of communication and ethnicity. Speke names his lake Victoria, but Burton names his lake Tanganyika. A fine film, but the actual facts are worth checking, even if they resolve nothing.

The British Empire owed a lot to opportunistic soldiers of fortune as well as to explorers: men who risked their lives (and the lives of others) for profit, fame and the recognition from their peers for their accomplishments. In the last category one could think of men like Livingstone, Stanley, Scott and Burton. Captain Richard Francis Burton (whose life we follow in this film) risked a lot for the sake of discovery (to find the source of the Nile) but at the same time he was also a man with a genuine interest and outmost respect for the indigenous peoples and cultures found deep in Africa.In the film we see Burton joining forces with a young and ambitious Lieutenant (Lt. Speke) to travel again to his beloved Africa to locate the source of Nile with an expedition funded by the Royal Geographical Society. The film is an account of this trip but shows also events before and after this. Watching this movie we can grasp the differences between the two men, their strong ties and friendship during their common effort in the expedition and also later how each one coped with their success at home (London).The Mountains of the Moon is a fascinating film. It tells a great story without romanticizing the situations during and after the trip to Africa. Burton, Speke and their comrades endured too much to find the source of Nile, and all of them for their own reasons. The novel by William Harrison (that this movie is based on) does not fall into the trap of trying to imitate Conrad's 'Heart of Darkness' but gives us a different perspective altogether. Do not miss this film.

This is an unusual historical film in that it focuses as much on the personal histories of the men involved (Sir Richard Burton and Lt. Speke), before and after their expedition, as it does on the momentous work they had undertaken, specifically the search for the source of the Nile. Along the way, they explored and mapped much of previously uncharted Africa while enduring disease, bad weather and desertions and thievery by their superstitious and unreliable porters.Great wide screen cinematography gives us lushly gorgeous vistas of Victorian-era Africa - convincingly unspoiled by modernity - while the close-ups show the intimate details of the journey in all of their hardship and horror. The result is a sweeping, yet personal adventure and a memorable viewing experience.

I had a choice at the Cinemas back in 1990 to see either Mountains of the Moon or Total Recall. I saw both advertised on the wall next to the concession stand. "What is Mountains of the Moon" I asked my self. This is the first I have heard of it. All of my friends and I were there to see Arnold kick some but.Which movie did I choose? Yeah..you guessed it.....Like a total brainwashed Zombie I chose the Arnold Movie. I was programmed and conditioned by hype to WANT to see Total Recall and noting else.I missed seeing a GREAT movie on the Big Screen. I would give anything to go back in time and choose differently. The visuals and scenes of MOTM were very fascinating even watching this on VHS some years later. The producers/distributors obviously lacked the big budget in 1990 for Advertising that the fat cats who made Total Recall did. ALSO, most Americans are probably too ignorant of History to even know anything about the Colonial Exploration of Africa - so the desire to see a film of this genre was low staring out.IN SHORT I highly recommend this movie. If you are a thinking person it will inspire you to desire to know more about these men who braved impossible odds to explore new worlds.Richard Burton's books are available in reprints from Dover Press. Did you know that he was the first White European to visit Mecca? Yes that could have been a movie itself. He wrote about it in a great book.IMPORTANT: This movie was based on a play called "Burton and Speake" and not on Burton's or Speake's writings. There are artistic licenses taken.