“People, animals, sensations!” This old advertising slogan from the circus industry fits few films better than “Hatari!” – brilliant directing, excellently-performing stars and lots of great scenes to marvel at and get you excited about.
“Hatari!” is an exciting adventure film set against a fantastic natural backdrop, directed by one of the greatest directors in Hollywood history. The classic is also a touching romance and, despite the many exciting action sequences, is always really funny. Alongside John Wayne, there are several other stars, including one of the most globally popular German actors of the 1960s in the second male lead role.
“Hatari!” will be broadcast today, August 31, 2024 at 8:15 p.m. on BR television. Alternatively, you can currently stream the FSK-12 title at no extra charge as part of the flat rate subscription from WOW (formerly Sky Ticket)*. It is also available as Blu-ray, DVD and paid video-on-demand:
“Hatari!” at Amazon*
The main roles alongside John Wayne were played by Elsa Martinelli (“The Trial”) and local star Hardy Krüger (“The Bridge at Arnhem”). Other important parts were played by Red Buttons (“Sayonara”), Gérard Blain (“The American Friend”), Michèle Girardon (“The Lovers”) and Bruce Cabot (“Diamonds Are Forever”).
“Hatari!”: This is the story
In East Africa we meet a group of fortune hunters, dropouts and characters who don’t fit in anywhere else, led by the American Sean Mercer (Wayne). With the help of local scouts in the Serengeti, their job is to capture and ship animals to zoos from all over the world – from monkeys to lions, from giraffes to rhinos.
The core of the team consists of the German ex-racing driver Kurt Müller (Krüger), the North American native Little Wolf (Cabot), the New York taxi driver Pockets (Buttons), the Mexican bullfighter Luis (Valentin de Vargas, “The Sign of Evil”) and Brandy (Giradon), who has just grown out of her teens. She took over the business from her deceased father and was for a long time something of a foster child for the men.
The animal trappers spend their days on the (bloodless) hunt and in the evenings drink together. But then the everyday life of the well-rehearsed group threatens to get out of balance when one of them is sent to hospital by an aggressive rhinoceros and a new addition to their ranks, French sniper Chips Maurey (Blain). And all this just when the equally attractive and opaque photographer Dallas (Martinelli) accompanies them at work…
Filmmaking as an adventure
Nowadays, there are quite rightly divided opinions about whether and how it is justifiable to simply tear wild animals from their native environment and then lock them up in zoos in far-off countries and put them on display. This is certainly a point that can, or even should, be discussed after the credits have rolled.
Apart from that, master director Howard Hawks (“Rio Bravo”, “The Dead Sleep Tight”) simply had a lot of fun here. The animal hunt, which was excitingly shot by chief cinematographer Russell Harlan (“Witness for the Prosecution”), who was nominated for an Oscar for his work, was just a means to an end. Hawks used it as a hook to show the audience how real friendship works – especially beyond age, gender and ethnic differences.
The fact that we believe the stars have such great chemistry with each other from the very first scenes is also because it was probably real. John Wayne and Bruce Cabot had often filmed together before “Hatari!” and were good buddies. According to reports, Hardy Krüger soon joined them every evening for a few whiskeys, as did other actors, crew members and Hawks himself.
Paramount Pictures Had fun in front of and behind the camera: John Wayne, Elsa Martinelli and Red Buttons (from left to right)
The extremely relaxed atmosphere on set probably contributed to the fact that no one was particularly worried about Hawks filming without a finished script. Many of the dialogues, but also the scenes with the wild animals, were simply improvised – after all, you never knew on the morning of a shooting day which beasts would get caught in the nets of the actors, who were often actually active themselves (there were no stuntmen!). A considerable portion of the resulting footage, which at times had a strong documentary feel, was only integrated into the plot during editing (Stuart Gilmore, “Duel in the Atlantic”). Much of it had to be dubbed later – on the one hand to give the story more shape, and on the other hand because the actors on location were simply not able to speak their dialogue clearly while wrestling with the animals.
Howard Hawks, who here, more than in any other of his titles, made filmmaking itself an adventure, created an extremely dynamic, unpredictably exciting work in which love is not neglected either. Regardless of whether it is the platonic affection between the hunters or the romantic affection between Wayne and Martinelli’s characters or that of Giradon, who had free choice, so to speak, from the remaining gentlemen who were all at her feet. All of this results in a film that is still incredibly entertaining today and presents a John Wayne who often acted in a typical way, but also occasionally in a completely unusual way.
John Wayne is, of course, best known for his roles in westerns – whether in “Hatari!” or “The Longest Day”, “The Conqueror” or “The House of Seven Sins”. Oscar winner Kevin Costner, who is currently in our cinemas with his monumental genre contribution “Horizon”, was particularly fond of one of these when he was a young boy. It sparked his love of the Wild West subject. In the following article you will find out which title it is:
“My first lasting impression of the cinema”: This western has extremely impressed “Yellowstone” star Kevin Costner
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