The Naked Jungle (1954)

Director:

Byron Haskin

Writers:

Philip Yordan (screenplay) (front for Ben Maddow) and
Ranald MacDougall (screenplay) ...
(more)

Release Date:

3 March 1954 (USA)

Genre:

Adventure | Drama | Thriller

Tagline:

He feared only two things on earth...the MARABUNTA...Nature's deadliest force, and his fiery New Orleans bride!

Plot:

The Leiningen South American cocoa plantation is threatened by a 2-mile-wide, 20-mile-long column of army ants.

Plot Keywords:

Plantation | Ants | Widow | Mail Order Bride | River

Cast

Eleanor Parker	...	Joanna Leiningen
Charlton Heston	...	Christopher Leiningen
Abraham Sofaer	...	Incacha
William Conrad	...	Commissioner
Romo Vincent	...	Boat Captain
Douglas Fowley	...	Medicine Man
John Dierkes	...	Gruber
Leonard Strong	...	Kutina
Norma Calderón	...	Zala (as Norma Calderon)
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Pilar Del Rey	...	Indian Wife (uncredited)
Bernie Gozier	...	Gruber's Indian (uncredited)
Jerry Groves	...	Gruber's Indian (uncredited)
Leon Lontoc	...	Indian (uncredited)
John Mansfield	...	Foreman (uncredited)
Ronald Alan Numkena	...	Indian Boy (uncredited)
Rodd Redwing	...	Indian (uncredited)
Jack Reitzen	...	Fat Man (uncredited)
Carlos Rivero	...	Indian Husband (uncredited)

Directed by
Byron Haskin

Writing credits
Philip Yordan		(screenplay) front for Ben Maddow and
Ranald MacDougall		(screenplay)
Carl Stephenson		(based on a story by)
Ben Maddow		screenplay (front Philip Yordan)

Produced by
Frank Freeman Jr.	....	associate producer
George Pal	....	producer

Original Music by
Daniele Amfitheatrof

Cinematography by
Ernest Laszlo		(director of photography)

Film Editing by
Everett Douglas

Art Direction by
Franz Bachelin
Hal Pereira

Set Decoration by
Sam Comer
Grace Gregory

Costume Design by
Edith Head

Makeup Department
Wally Westmore	....	makeup supervisor
Charles Gemora	....	makeup artist (uncredited)

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Herbert Coleman	....	assistant director
Arthur Rosson	....	second unit director

Sound Department
Gene Garvin	....	sound recordist
Harry Lindgren	....	sound recordist

Special Effects by
Charles Gemora	....	mechanical designer: ants (uncredited)

Visual Effects by
Farciot Edouart	....	process photography
John P. Fulton	....	special photographic effects

Camera and Electrical Department
Loyal Griggs	....	photographer: second unit

Costume and Wardrobe Department
Joan Joseff	....	costume jeweller (uncredited)

Music Department
Daniele Amfitheatrof	....	conductor (uncredited)
Sidney Cutner	....	orchestrator (uncredited)
Maurice De Packh	....	orchestrator (uncredited)

Other crew
Richard Mueller	....	technicolor color consultant
Reginald Lal Singh	....	technical advisor

Production Companies

• Paramount Pictures

Distributors

• Paramount Pictures (1954) (USA) (theatrical)
• National Broadcasting Company (NBC) (1965) (USA) (TV)
• Paramount Pictures (1988) (USA) (VHS) (pan and scan)
• Paramount Home Video (2004) (USA) (DVD)
• Paramount Home Video (2006) (USA) (DVD) (Spanish)
• AFEX (1954) (Austria) (theatrical)
• Paramount Home Video (????) (USA) (video) (laserdisc)

Also Known As:

Runtime:

95 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Recording)

Certification:

Argentina:16 | Chile:18 | Finland:K-16 | Spain:18 | Sweden:15 | USA:Approved (PCA #16799) | UK:12 (re-rating) (2005) | UK:A (original rating) | Australia:PG | West Germany:12

Filming Locations:

Florahome, Florida, USA

Company:

Paramount Pictures

Trivia:

While preparing to shoot the sequence where Leiningen pours oil on himself to repel the ants, Charlton Heston was told that oil would ruin his wardrobe so syrup would be used instead. Heston spent a miserable day on location as the "oil" attracted every insect for miles.

Goofs:

Boom mic visible: During the first meeting/"confrontation" between Joanna and Christopher there comes a point in the conversation when he asks her if she is 'laughing at him.' As she turns from the dresser to face him at the very upper left corner for approx. 35 frames the moving shadow of what may well be a boom mic can easily be seen as it follows the motion.

Quotes:

Joanna Leiningen:Do you think this moat will stop them?
Christopher Leiningen:Ants are strictly land creatures. They can't swim. Right, Incacha?
Incacha:Monkeys not swim also. They cross rivers even so.
Christopher Leiningen:The intelligence of monkeys is more than ants, less than man.
Incacha:Is so.
[laughing]
Incacha:When ants come, monkeys run.

Movie Connections:

Featured in "MacGyver: Trumbo's World (#1.6)" (1985)

Leiningen, A Man With Issues

Given the fact that this is the Fifties and the Code was coming to an end, this is still a remarkably erotic film, almost Tennessee Williams like in its treatment of sexual issues.

Charlton Heston's Christopher Leiningen could have been created by Tennessee Willlams. He came to the South American jungles as a teenager and built up a plantation out of the jungle and it took him over 15 years to do it. He now decides to get himself a wife and begat some children.

Heston says so quite frankly he has pointedly refrained from indulging any lust with the native women because in his society there'a a nasty name for whites who do so. In keeping with his Tennessee Williams like character, he's from New Orleans so his attitude to darker skinned people is understandable.

He has his brother put in an advertisement for a mail order bride and Heston can't believe his luck when the drop dead gorgeous Eleanor Parker shows up on his door. She's not what you would picture a mail order bride to be. But then marital problems arise when he discovers she's a widow, used goods as the common phrase was back in the day.

Parker has a few of her own issues and that and Heston's inexperience in these matters lead to a rocky start and almost an ending. But then come the ants.

As District Commissioner William Conrad says, every generation or two something puts ants in the ants pants and up they come out of their ant hills and go on the march destroying every scrap of life before them. And man has found no way to stop them.

The ants kind of make everyone come together in a crisis. What they do is some of the most frightening stuff ever put on film.

If The Naked Jungle were made today it would be far more explicit about all the sexual problems than this version was. There might be better special effects. But you won't get better players than you will in Charlton Heston and Eleanor Parker as leads.

Unless they resurrected Tennessee Williams to write the screenplay.