Search - Forbidden Territory: Stanley's Search for Livingstone on DVD

A Visit to

Tuan Robo | 06/11/2007

(3 out of 5 stars)

"My most recent order from Amazon.com was Forbidden Territory: Stanley's Search for Livingstone. While this wasn't a great movie, it was a well-made movie that was more than worth the $[...] I paid for it. The film does the job I ask of it: portraying the Dark Continent, the Africa of adventure.

A National Geographic Television presentation, Forbidden Territory perfectly captures the period. We see African henchman, Europe's finest explorers and its basest adventurers, the mustachioed, tuxedo-clad "armchair geographers" of Royal Geographic Society, a faithful missonary, and the poor souls he sought to protect from Arab slavers. The costuming was great, right down to Livingstone's little blue "conductor's" cap and the motley pugaree on Stanley's pith helmet.

While the film de-demonizes Livingstone and Stanley so much that it would send any post-colonialist Cult-of-Achebe English prof into a pontificating hissy fit, it thoroughly develops Stanley's character, portraying him as a tormented soul and an indomitable survivor, partially through a series of flashbacks to his days as a Welsh [...] in a workhouse and his days as a Confederate soldier. In spite of Aidan Quinn's best efforts to overact the part in a few scenes. Fortunately, the casting of Nigel Hawthorne as old Doc Livingstone was pure genius. To paraphrase Troy McClure, "it was the part he was born to play, baby."

In a nutshell, Forbidden Territory is no Lawrence of Arabia, but it is a pretty good period piece guaranteed to delight anyone who has ever dreamed of battling tsetse flies and Somalis."

Beautiful depiction of a time in history

Falgun Jariwala | 02/08/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I ordered this video because my son was doing a project on world explorers and his subject was Dr. Livingston. But when I saw this movie, it took me back in time and into a world not too far from our present time, but yet so distant. The photography, acting and pace are beautiful. It is amazing to see a world from less than 150 years ago when a large continent was uncharted, devoid of automobiles, airplanes, railways, satellites, cameras, tape recorders, etc.; and a handful of people were walking a few miles each day, taking notes in journals and charting the dark continent. This movie is a time piece.

My only disappointment was that it covers only the last days of Livingston's life and not his discovery of Victoria Falls, etc. Another movie I recommend along with this is "Mountains of the Moon" which has nothing to do with Livingston but is a few years down the time line, and is a spectacular adventure to discover the source of the Nile."

Outstanding Histoical Adventure

Capt FB Bohannon | Oceanside, Oregon | 11/25/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This and "Mountains of the Moon" are the difinitive DVD's on the search for the Source of the Nile. Well worth having in your library.
I have been to Africa on Safari several times and am very interested in the early African history of exploration and hunting which very often overlapped each other.
Wish there were more movies like these...Excellent"

Doctor Livington story, I pressume

Eric M. Montiel | 06/05/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I really liked this movie. I had heard a comment by Pastor Ravi Zachariah about this being a good movie, I recommend it to anyone and everyone. "Doctor Livingston, I pressume" were words that I learned early in my childhood from the cartoon on a black and white screen. I have a new respect for Dr Livington legacy and life of Missionary devotion, only the true calling of God is understood by the men and women who live in the places where no other human being would dare to be.
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