White Pongo — White Pongo( DVD)
White Pongo is a cheap and cheerful jungle movie, originally released in 1945, and directed by legendary B-movie director Sam Newfield (Racing Luck, Go Get ‘Em Hains and Adventure Island). The film stars Richard Fraser (The Picture of Dorian Gray, Bedlam and The Cobra Strikes), Maris Wrixon (The Ape, The Case of the Black Parrot and The Master Key), Lionel Royce (Road to Zanzibar, Crown of Thorns and Victory) and Al Eben (Hawaii 5-0, Hold That Line and Lightnin’ in the Forest).
Director Newfield was one of the most prolific filmmakers in Hollywood, during his 30-year career he churned out somewhere in the region of 350 movies. White Pongo was fairly typical of his oeuvre, it cost little to make and was put together within a very short period of time. Newfield used several pseudonyms including Peter Stewart and Sherman Scott in order to hide the fact that he was responsible for directing so many of the movies released by PRC Pictures, the company headed up by his brother Sigmund Neufeld.
The film follows a group of anthropologists and hunters who head into the Congo on a mission to find the missing link, a white gorilla, the White Pongo of the title. This idea that the white ape is somehow a closer relative to man than the black ape seems suspiciously racist, however, this is not the only film of this era to make such seemingly xenophobic commentary. The dodgy names persist with one native character being named Mumbo Jumbo. Putting these issues to one side let’s concentrate on the film at hand.
The movie’s female lead Maris Wrixon plays Pamela Bragdon, who alongside her father, Sir Harry Bragdon (Gordon Richards) joins the aforementioned expedition into the jungle to find White Pongo. Richard Fraser plays her bodyguard, Bishop who has really joined the expedition to keep an eye on their guide, Hans Kroegert (Al Ebden) who is suspected of the murder of the anthropologist whose diary has led the group to this hunt.
The movie itself is fairly typical of the time period, cheap and cheerful. The acting is adequate and the jungle cinematography is fine, however the film itself is quite boring with loads of scenes of the expedition hiking through the jungle or simply paddling up the river in canoes. The ape suits are completely unrealistic, and it’s easy to see that it’s actually just a man dressed up. Despite all of its many flaws it still has something of a charm about it. The ape fights are hilariously awful but fun and you can’t help watching despite everything that is wrong with the film.
On the technical side of things, the picture quality is nothing special, it probably doesn’t look a great deal better than it did on VHS, and the audio track sounds muffled. The only bonus materials are a couple of trailers for other titles released on the Cheezy Movies label, but with a film of this age and quality, it is unsurprising.