Adventures in South America

Adventures in South America (1935)

** (out of 4)

This Warner short is pretty much just a travelogue showing off Bolivia, Peru and other cities connected to the Andes Mountains. We see how little has changed over the decades here as people pretty much dress, farm and build homes like they were doing hundreds of years ago. Narrator Knox Manning introduces us to the people and shows us around the cities giving us its history. If this type of short sounds familiar to you then you're probably familiar with MGM's TravelTalks series. I must admit that watching this short made me appreciate the MGM series even more than I already do. There's no question that both series feature pretty much the same stuff as we get the history lesson in the narration and of course we get the images via Technicolor. The difference is that the stuff we see in the MGM stuff is actually well made. I found the cinematography here to be extremely weak and there were times where it appeared a young child must have been holding the camera due to how shaky it was. Even Manning's narration wasn't all that great and I really felt that the running time was dragging.

A Warner Bros. Short Subject.

Travel through the ancient Indian lands of Bolivia & Peru for some high ADVENTURES IN SOUTH AMERICA.

This short film takes viewers on a Technicolor tour of the Andes, where we see some of the fiestas & festivals of the native peoples, as well as paying a visit to Lake Titicaca. After viewing the Incan & Colonial architecture of La Paz, Cuzco & Lima we are given a glimpse of the savages living at the headwaters of the Amazon River.

Often overlooked or neglected today, the one and two-reel short subjects were useful to the Studios as important training grounds for new or burgeoning talents, both in front & behind the camera. The dynamics for creating a successful short subject was completely different from that of a feature length film, something akin to writing a topnotch short story rather than a novel. Economical to produce in terms of both budget & schedule and capable of portraying a wide range of material, short subjects were the perfect complement to the Studios' feature films.

ADVENTURES IN SOUTH America is a cursory look at Peru of '46, showing the contrast between the Old Peru and primitive farmers and thatched huts and the new modern cities like Lima.

It starts with a look at the old, including a mixture of old and new costumes that can be seen in the market in La Paz. Colorful costumes are adorned during fiesta days and we see the Lake Chiticaca area where sailing crafts and riverboats glide on the waters.

We take a look at Inca cities where walls and streets were built by primitive building standards but still stand today. Peruvian farmers and their wives work in the fields. We see a swinging bridge made of fiber (and expect to see Indiana Jones crossing at any moment), and stop for awhile at Lima, a colonial town founded by Pizarro in the 1500s and updated with modern construction as the capital of Peru.

The documentary closes with a look along the Amazon where the savage headhunter tribes are shown standing around in a group, and nearby are the head trophies decorated and preserved in a fancy manner.

Colorful but rather dull in the manner of presentation.