GUNGA DIN

"How can we start a nice little war?"--GUNGA DIN

This evening I saw George Stevens' GUNGA DIN--for maybe the third time--with the Classic Movie Meetup.  Like SUNRISE, we saw it on the video screen at the Central pub in Mirvish Village. (As I was arriving there, I could hear Vince Vaughan saying, "You're coming later than the others.  Smart move, baby!")

The movie is a hodgepodge of mostly enjoyable Hollywood kitsch.  The original director was Howard Hawks before he got sacked in mid-shoot, and there's a big element of Hawksian bromance.   The credits claim that it's "based on historical fact" about the Thuggee, which makes me suspicious:  I'll have to do some Wikipedia research.  As it was, I found myself rooting for the thugs!

In the climax, the thugs capture our heroes but don't kill them because they want them to witness their army's destruction, which screenwriters call the Penguin cliche. (The Penguin was always taking Batman prisoner on the '60s TV show but keeping him alive so the latter could see his latest climactic villainy.) Notice also that they should have done a better job of stabbing Sam Jaffe in the back.