Suddenly, flames erupt at one end of the big top. In all the confusion, few movie-goers probably noticed that the lions have suddenly turned into tigers and that Kit has become Mabel Stark. This and the following circus fire scenes are all taken from the climax of KING OF THE JUNGLE, a 1933 Paramount A-picture that, ironically, had starred Buster Crabbe as a Tarzan-like wild animal trainer. In its negotiations with DeMille, Ringling was adamant that no fire scenes be included in TGSOE, since memories of the Hartford fire were still fresh in everyone’s memories. No such restrictions were imposed on the producers of CAGED FURY, who were able to make good use of scenes from the elaborate and well-staged circus fire from KING OF THE JUNGLE. |
Sunday, January 22, 2012
Caged Fury #56
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A pictorial synopsis of KING OF THE JUNGLE appeared on Buckles’ Blog in February 2009 and should be available for viewing in the archives.
Along with lions becoming tigers, and Kit becoming Mabel with a change of wardrobe, the audience also would not have paid attention to a different set of props in a different arena. I have to be highly critical of the producers for not demanding new scenes from their writers, and for taking the low road of using unexplained changes in the featured animal act, and cutting in footage from an earlier picture. Even though this was a fairly common practice, and somebody saved money, they still short-changed their audience, and lost prestige as filmmakers.
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