Tropic Zone | |
---|---|
Directed by | Lewis R. Foster |
Screenplay by | Lewis R. Foster |
Based on | novel Gentlemen of the Jungle by Tom Gill |
Produced by | William H. Pine William C. Thomas |
Starring | Ronald Reagan Rhonda Fleming Estelita Rodriguez Noah Beery Jr. Grant Withers John Wengraf |
Cinematography | Lionel Lindon |
Edited by | Howard A. Smith |
Music by | Lucien Cailliet |
Production company | |
Distributed by | Paramount Pictures |
Release date |
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Running time | 94 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Tropic Zone is a 1953 American crime film written and directed by Lewis R. Foster and starring Ronald Reagan, Rhonda Fleming, Estelita Rodriguez, Noah Beery Jr., Grant Withers and John Wengraf. It was released on January 14, 1953, by Paramount Pictures. [1] [2] [3] [4]
Reagan's character, Dan McCloud, is an American (described as a "soldier of fortune" in the publicity for the picture's release [5] ) who becomes the foreman of a Central American banana plantation. Learning that his employer, Lukats, is corrupt and trying to corner the market, McCloud joins with one of the smaller growers (played by Rhonda Fleming) to organize the workers and stop Lukats' scheme. [6]
The film was based on a 1939 novel by Tom Gill called Gentlemen of the Jungle about a banana plantation in British Honduras. [7] In May 1951 the producers at Pine-Thomas Productions read a copy of the novel en route to the premiere of their film The Last Outpost in Tucson. They bought the film rights intending to make it a vehicle for Rhoda Fleming, as the last of a four-picture deal she had with Pine-Thomas. (Earlier films included Last Outpost, Crosswinds and Hong Kong.) [8] Ronald Reagan eventually signed to co star.
Estelita Rodriguez was borrowed from Republic.
Paramount built a large set for the film, reportedly the studio's biggest new set in ten years. Designed by art director A. Earl Hedrick together with studio supervisor Hal Pereira, and covering four stages, the set depicted "a complete Caribbean native village", with "16 buildings, irrigation ditches, five hilltops, a schoolhouse, two roads, two streams, a complicated powerhouse" and more. [9] Edith Head, who had already won the first four of her eight Academy Awards, handled the costumes for the film, highlighted by Fleming's fourteen different outfits, all of them in "jungle tones". [10]
Reagan later dismissed the film as a "sand and banana" picture with a "hopeless" script. [11] [12]
Wallace Fitzgerald Beery was an American film and stage actor. He is best known for his portrayal of Bill in Min and Bill (1930) opposite Marie Dressler, as General Director Preysing in Grand Hotel (1932), as the pirate Long John Silver in Treasure Island (1934), as Pancho Villa in Viva Villa! (1934), and his title role in The Champ (1931), for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor. Beery appeared in some 250 films during a 36-year career. His contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer stipulated in 1932 that he would be paid $1 more than any other contract player at the studio. This made Beery the highest-paid film actor in the world during the early 1930s. He was the brother of actor Noah Beery and uncle of actor Noah Beery Jr.
George Randolph Scott was an American film actor, whose Hollywood career spanned from 1928 to 1962. As a leading man for all but the first three years of his cinematic career, Scott appeared in dramas, comedies, musicals, adventures, war, horror and fantasy films, and Westerns. Out of his more than 100 film appearances, more than 60 of them were Westerns.
Jane Wyman was an American actress. A star of both movies and television, she received an Academy Award for Best Actress (1948), four Golden Globe Awards and nominations for two Primetime Emmy Awards. In 1960 she received stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for both motion pictures and television. She was the first wife of President Ronald Reagan.
Dorothy Lamour was an American actress and singer. She is best remembered for having appeared in the Road to... movies, a series of successful comedies starring Bing Crosby and Bob Hope.
Edith Claire Head was an American costume designer who won a record eight Academy Awards for Best Costume Design between 1949 and 1973, making her the most awarded woman in the Academy's history. Head is considered to be one of the greatest and most influential costume designers in film history.
Clara Lou "Ann" Sheridan was an American actress and singer. She is best known for her roles in the films San Quentin (1937) with Humphrey Bogart, Angels with Dirty Faces (1938) with James Cagney and Bogart, They Drive by Night (1940) with George Raft and Bogart, City for Conquest (1940) with Cagney and Elia Kazan, The Man Who Came to Dinner (1942) with Bette Davis, Kings Row (1942) with Ronald Reagan, Nora Prentiss (1947), and I Was a Male War Bride (1949) with Cary Grant.
Richard Thorpe was an American film director best known for his long career at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
Rhonda Fleming was an American film and television actress and singer. She acted in more than 40 films, mostly in the 1940s and 1950s, and became renowned as one of the most glamorous actresses of her day, nicknamed the "Queen of Technicolor" because she photographed so well in that medium.
Noah Lindsey Beery was an American actor often specializing in warm, friendly character roles similar to many portrayed by his Oscar-winning uncle, Wallace Beery. Unlike his more famous uncle, however, Beery Jr. seldom broke away from playing supporting roles. Active as an actor in films or television for well over half a century, he was best known for playing James Garner's character's father, Joseph "Rocky" Rockford, in the NBC television series The Rockford Files (1974–1980). His father, Noah Beery, enjoyed a similarly lengthy film career as an extremely prominent supporting actor in major films, although the elder Beery was also frequently a leading man during the silent film era.
Marjorie Burnet Rambeau was an American film and stage actress. She began her stage career at age 12, and appeared in several silent films before debuting in her first sound film, Her Man (1930). She was twice nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her roles in Primrose Path (1940) and Torch Song (1953), and received the 1955 National Board of Review Award for Best Supporting Actress for her roles in A Man Called Peter and The View from Pompey's Head.
Pine-Thomas Productions was a prolific B-picture unit of Paramount Pictures from 1940–1957, producing 81 films. Co-producers William H. Pine and William C. Thomas were known as the "Dollar Bills" because none of their economically made films ever lost money. "We don't want to make million dollar pictures," they said. "We just want to make a million dollars."
Oracabessa is a small town in Saint Mary Parish, Jamaica 16 kilometres (10 mi) east of Ocho Rios. Its population is nearly 7,000. Lit in the afternoons by an apricot light that may have inspired its Spanish name, Oracabeza, or "Golden Head," Oracabessa's commercial district consists of a covered produce market and a few shops and bars. The main street is a narrow promenade with a number of well-maintained buildings in the early 20th-century Jamaican vernacular tradition.
Estelita Rodriguez was a Cuban actress best known for her roles in many Westerns with Roy Rogers for Republic Pictures, as well as her role in Howard Hawks' Rio Bravo. Her birth date was in dispute; studio biographies claimed 1928, but her wedding announcement of May 1945 cited her age as 19 as certified before a superior court judge, which would place her year of birth at 1925.
Sangaree is a 1953 American 3-D color period costume drama film by director Edward Ludwig. It was adapted from the 1948 novel of the same name by Frank G. Slaughter.
The Last Outpost is a 1951 American Technicolor Western film directed by Lewis R. Foster, set in the American Civil War with brothers on opposite sides. This film is character actor Burt Mustin's film debut at the age of 67.
Little Egypt is a 1951 American Technicolor comedy drama film directed by Frederick de Cordova starring Mark Stevens and Rhonda Fleming. It is a highly fictionalised biography of the dancer Little Egypt in the 1890s.
Lucy Gallant is a 1955 American drama film directed by Robert Parrish and written by John Lee Mahin and Winston Miller. The film stars Jane Wyman, Charlton Heston, Claire Trevor, Thelma Ritter, William Demarest and Wallace Ford. The film was released on October 20, 1955, by Paramount Pictures.
Those Redheads from Seattle is a 1953 American musical western film produced in 3-D directed by Lewis R. Foster and starring Rhonda Fleming, Gene Barry and Agnes Moorehead, and released by Paramount Pictures. It was the first 3-D musical.
Jivaro is a 1954 American 3-D adventure film directed by Edward Ludwig and starring Fernando Lamas, Rhonda Fleming and Brian Keith. Publicity material for the film translates Jivaro as "headhunters of the Amazon". Originally filmed in 3-D, due to a decline in interest Jivaro was not presented in that format in its original 1954 theatrical release. It finally had its 3-D debut on September 17, 2006 at "The World 3-D Expo" in Hollywood.
The Vanquished is a 1953 American Western film directed by Edward Ludwig, written by Lewis R. Foster, Winston Miller and Frank L. Moss, and starring John Payne, Jan Sterling, Coleen Gray, Lyle Bettger, Willard Parker, Roy Gordon and John Dierkes. It was released on June 3, 1953, by Paramount Pictures.