Beautiful Bali (1940) User Reviews

it's Bali

[SnoopyStyle · 7/10 · 3 December 2022]

TravelTalks travels to Bali in the Dutch East Indies. It starts with the rice paddies in front of a gorgeous ocean. It's picture-perfect scenery. The men bring various produce to the market. The locals play their music as the girls dance at their temple. There is more music and dance. There are the fishmen and then there is the start of a tourist industry.

Bali looks great. It has a great exotic quality. James A. FitzPatrick's narration does get condescending sometimes although even that can't take away the beauty of the place. It's Bali. It's beautiful. It's not completely over-run by tourists yet.

One of the better Traveltalks thanks to the scenery

[jlewis77-1 · 7/10 · 25 April 2009]

James FitzPatrick supervised 175+ (never sure of exact count) Traveltalk one-reelers for MGM between 1930 and 1953 (and an additional 9 or so later for Paramount, dubbed "VistaVision Visits"). Filmed in glorious Technicolor (beginning with 1934's "Holland In Tulip Time"), they provided exotic eye-candy to Depression and wartime audiences who couldn't leave their hometowns. Since they were ridiculously cheap to make (resembling "home movies" blown to 35mm size), MGM decided to cut back on other Technicolor shorts in the later thirties apart from cartoons and occasional Pete Smith "Specialties"; by then most major Metro features, black & white or color, had a Traveltalk to go with it.

Viewed individually with unrelated shorts and features, they boast plenty of nostalgic appeal. However, watching a bunch of them together is a very boring experience. The obsession with old landmarks, minus pop culture references and people close-ups, makes it difficult to "date" them; thirties and early fifties Traveltalks are practically indistinguishable. Other studios like Warner Bros. put a bit more "oomph" in their travelogues and avoided repetition, particularly those made by Andre de la Varre. My impression is that both FitzPatrick and MGM were sleepwalking their way through this series simply because theater owners were demanding color shorts on their programs.

The standouts include "India On Parade" (a personal favorite), some of the Japanese and early National Park entries and this one, which includes a higher percentage of "people footage" and showcases Bali as always "beautiful". I'm guessing cameraman Robert Carney was less timid getting close to the "natives" than his contemporaries and they all smile a lot at his jokes. The dance sequences are quite impressive too; one very athletic "star" could have been the subject of his own documentary short. Also, like some of the earlier Jack Cardiff productions, Carney's images appear much sharper than usual, with above-average composition.

"Tourists now crowd the beaches that were recently . . . "

[oscaralbert · 6/10 · 9 February 2019]

" . . . the exclusive domain of brown feet," bewails BEAUTIFUL BALI narrator "Billy Fitz-something." Obviously, Bill sees his primary function here as being a deterrent to Travel. This is so much in the interest of the American State Department that viewers would not be surprised to learn that this entire "Travel Talk" series in underwritten and edited by the Feds. After all, it is far cheaper to have one guy bouncing around the Globe warning away foolhardy would-be trekkers from leaving the friendly confines of the USA Homeland than facing the constant need to issue "Travel Advisories" to suddenly peripatetic U.S. Citizens, and then to feel obligated to conduct (or go through a charade of) "hostage negotiations" when they inevitably fall into the vile clutches of North Koreans, Russians, Iranians, or Italians. Nowadays, of course, it would be far easier to ward off prospective sojourners to Bali by highlighting the recent incidences of volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, and tsunamis. However, Bouncing Bill does his best throughout BEAUTIFUL BALI, warning viewers about the fact that "every Balinese gal strives from the age of four to become a Temple Dancer, in the hope that she might be selected as an ultimate sacrifice." Back in the Innocent 1940s, tourist ladies wore white, giving them an incentive to avoid the arterial spray at human sacrifice sites like The Plague. (No one could predict with any accuracy which way the wind would scatter the splatter.)

I Don't Think Of Rice When I Think Of Bali

[boblipton · 5/10 · 3 December 2022]

James A. Fitzpatrick sends the Technicolor cameras to the fabled island under the supervision of Robert Carney to shoot rice paddies, marketplaces, betel nuts, and the bands and dancers -- which are what I think of when I think of Bali, not the two million dollars worth of rice the island exported in 1939 which fascinates Fitzpatrick. Well, I suppose different things interest different people.

The copy of this episode of the Traveltalk series that plays on Turner Classic Movies is in very nice shape, particular the color elements, which show off the greens and browns very attractively. That's the thing about the series: I find Fitzpatrick's narration annoying, but his Technicolor cameramen were first rate.

TravelTalks

[Michael_Elliott · 2 May 2009]

Beautiful Bali (1940)

*** (out of 4)

James A. FitzPatrick's TravelTalks series was a long running one and while most entries stayed at the same so-so level, there were those that stepped up and delivered more. This episode is one of those as we take a trip to Bali, India, which has become quite popular over the past year thanks in large part to SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE. What makes this film so interesting is that we get to see some slums and how things operate there. We see these large shops with all sorts of things being sold and then we're told that it would only take a couple American dollars to buy all of it. We see several children who are clearly looking at a camera for the first time in their young lives and this here is another unique thing. The entire short has a good feel to it and that makes it one of the better episodes.