Lost Horizon (1973 film)
Encyclopedia
Lost Horizon is a 1973 musical film
directed by Charles Jarrott
and starring Peter Finch
, John Gielgud
, Liv Ullmann
, Michael York
, Sally Kellerman
, Bobby Van, George Kennedy, Olivia Hussey
, James Shigeta
and Charles Boyer
.
The film is a remake
of Frank Capra
's film of the same name, with a screenplay by Larry Kramer
. Both the 1937 film and this one had their story from James Hilton
's novel Lost Horizon.
This was final film produced by Ross Hunter
.
, where the party is rescued and taken to the lamasery of Shangri-La
. Miraculously, Shangri-La, sheltered by mountains on all sides, is a temperate paradise amid the land of snows. Perfect health is the norm, and inhabitants live to very old age while maintaining a youthful appearance.
The newcomers quickly adjust to life in Shangri-La, especially Richard Conway (Peter Finch
), the group's leader. He meets and falls in love with Catherine (Liv Ullmann
), a school teacher. Sally Hughes (Sally Kellerman
), a drug-addicted Newsweek
photographer is suicidal at first, but begins counselling with lamas Chang (John Gielgud
) and To Len (James Shigeta
) and discovers a new lease of life. Sam Cornelius (George Kennedy
) discovers gold, but Sally convinces him to use his engineering skills to bring better irrigation to the famers of Shangri-La instead of attempting to smuggle the gold out. Harry Lovett (Bobby Van) is a third-rate comic and song and dance
man who discovers he has a flair for working with the children of Shangri-La. Everyone is content to stay except Conway's younger brother, George (Michael York
). George has fallen in love with Maria (Olivia Hussey
), a dancer, and wants to take her with him when he leaves. Chang warns Richard that Maria came to Shangri-La over eighty years before, at the age of twenty. If she were to leave the valley she would quickly revert to her actual age.
Richard is summoned to meet the High Lama (Charles Boyer
), who informs him that he was brought there for a reason, to take over the leadership of the community when he himself dies. However, the night that the High Lama dies, George and Maria tell Richard that everything the High Lama and Chang have said is a lie, and convince him to leave with them immediately. Richard is still in shock from the High Lama's death, and leaves without even saying goodbye to Catherine. Not long after their departure Maria suddenly ages and dies, and George falls to his death down an icy ravine. Richard struggles on alone, ending up in a hospital bed in the Himalayan foothills. He runs away, back to the mountains, and miraculously finds the portal to Shangri-La once more.
. Attempts to update the idea of Shangri-La
with its racial inequalities intact, coupled with old-fashioned songs effectively sealed its fate. Pauline Kael
noted that Shangri-La was depicted as:
After derided preview screenings Columbia Pictures
re-cut the film, but to no avail. Critic John Simon
remarked that it "must have arrived in garbage rather than in film cans". The songs were written by Burt Bacharach
and Hal David
, whose long partnership hit rocky ground within months of this film's release. The film was such a poor performer at the box office that it was nicknamed "Lost Investment." Bette Midler
called the musical "Lost Her-Reason" and famously quipped, "I never miss a Liv Ullman musical."
(Ullman later appeared in Richard Rodgers' last Broadway musical, yet another flop for the 'Swedish nightengale,' adapted from the John Van Druten play, and dubbed "I Dismembered Mama.")
The film was selected for inclusion in the book "50 Worst Films of All Time," co-written by film critic Michael Medved.
However Peter Finch has said he enjoyed making the film.
, the deal he engineered for this, combined with savvy investments, made it possible for him to live the rest of his creative life free of financial worries. In that sense, this film enabled Kramer to devote himself to the gay community activism and the writings (e.g., his ground-breaking AIDS play, The Normal Heart
) which came later.
.
Of the lead actors, only Sally Kellerman
, Bobby Van, and James Shigeta
perform their own singing. Olivia Hussey
, Peter Finch
and Liv Ullman were dubbed by Andra Willis
, Jerry Whitman, and Diana Lee
respectively. The song "Living Together, Growing Together" was a minor hit for The 5th Dimension. The song "Things I Will Not Miss" was covered by Diana Ross
and Marvin Gaye
during recording sessions for the 1973 album Diana and Marvin.
Large parts of the score were deleted after the film's road show
release. The dance sections of "Living Together, Growing Together" were cut, and the master negatives lost. "If I Could Go Back", "Where Knowledge Ends (Faith Begins)", and "I Come To You" were cut, but restored for the laserdisc
release of the film. All of the songs appear on the soundtrack LP and CD. According to the notes on the laserdisc release, Kellerman and Kennedy had a reprise of "Living Together, Growing Together" that was also lost.
Musical film
The musical film is a film genre in which songs sung by the characters are interwoven into the narrative, sometimes accompanied by dancing. The songs usually advance the plot or develop the film's characters, though in some cases they serve merely as breaks in the storyline, often as elaborate...
directed by Charles Jarrott
Charles Jarrott
Charles Jarrott was a British film and television director. He was best known for costume dramas he directed for producer Hal B...
and starring Peter Finch
Peter Finch
Peter Finch was a British-born Australian actor. He is best remembered for his role as "crazed" television anchorman Howard Beale in the film Network, which earned him a posthumous Academy Award for Best Actor, his fifth Best Actor award from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, and a...
, John Gielgud
John Gielgud
Sir Arthur John Gielgud, OM, CH was an English actor, director, and producer. A descendant of the renowned Terry acting family, he achieved early international acclaim for his youthful, emotionally expressive Hamlet which broke box office records on Broadway in 1937...
, Liv Ullmann
Liv Ullmann
Liv Johanne Ullmann is a Norwegian actress and film director, as well as one of the "muses" of the Swedish director Ingmar Bergman...
, Michael York
Michael York (actor)
Michael York, OBE is an English actor.-Early life:York was born in Fulmer, Gerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire, the son of Florence Edith May , a musician; and Joseph Gwynne Johnson, a Llandovery born Welsh ex-Royal Artillery British Army officer and executive with Marks and Spencer department stores...
, Sally Kellerman
Sally Kellerman
Sally Clare Kellerman is an American actress and singer known for her role as Major Margaret "Hot Lips" Houlihan in the film MASH , for which she was nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress in a Supporting Role.-Early life:...
, Bobby Van, George Kennedy, Olivia Hussey
Olivia Hussey
Olivia Hussey is an Argentinian actress who became famous for her role as Juliet in Franco Zeffirelli's Academy Award-winning 1968 film version of Romeo and Juliet. For this role she won the Golden Globe Award for New Star of the Year - Actress as well as the David di Donatello for best actress...
, James Shigeta
James Shigeta
James Shigeta is an American film and television actor. He is also a standards singer, musical theatre and nightclub performer, and recording artist. He is a Nisei or second-generation American of Japanese ancestry.-Early life:...
and Charles Boyer
Charles Boyer
Charles Boyer was a French actor who appeared in more than 80 films between 1920 and 1976. After receiving an education in drama, Boyer started on the stage, but he found success in movies during the 1930s. His memorable performances were among the era's most highly praised romantic dramas,...
.
The film is a remake
Remake
A remake is a piece of media based primarily on an earlier work of the same medium.-Film:The term "remake" is generally used in reference to a movie which uses an earlier movie as the main source material, rather than in reference to a second, later movie based on the same source...
of Frank Capra
Frank Capra
Frank Russell Capra was a Sicilian-born American film director. He emigrated to the U.S. when he was six, and eventually became a creative force behind major award-winning films during the 1930s and 1940s...
's film of the same name, with a screenplay by Larry Kramer
Larry Kramer
Larry Kramer is an American playwright, author, public health advocate, and LGBT rights activist. He began his career rewriting scripts while working for Columbia Pictures, which led him to London where he worked with United Artists. There he wrote the screenplay for Women in Love in 1969, earning...
. Both the 1937 film and this one had their story from James Hilton
James Hilton
James Hilton was an English novelist who wrote several best-sellers, including Lost Horizon and Goodbye, Mr. Chips.-Biography:...
's novel Lost Horizon.
This was final film produced by Ross Hunter
Ross Hunter
Ross Hunter was a Hollywood film producer.-Biography:Hunter was born in Cleveland, Ohio as Martin Fuss. After serving in Army intelligence during World War II, he signed a movie contract with Columbia Pictures and acted in a number of B-movie musicals...
.
Synopsis
This version is much closer to the 1937 film than to the original James Hilton novel. It tells the story of a group of travellers whose airplane is hijacked while fleeing a bloody revolution. The airplane crash lands in an unexplored area of the HimalayasHimalayas
The Himalaya Range or Himalaya Mountains Sanskrit: Devanagari: हिमालय, literally "abode of snow"), usually called the Himalayas or Himalaya for short, is a mountain range in Asia, separating the Indian subcontinent from the Tibetan Plateau...
, where the party is rescued and taken to the lamasery of Shangri-La
Shangri-La
Shangri-La is a fictional place described in the 1933 novel Lost Horizon by British author James Hilton. Hilton describes Shangri-La as a mystical, harmonious valley, gently guided from a lamasery, enclosed in the western end of the Kunlun Mountains...
. Miraculously, Shangri-La, sheltered by mountains on all sides, is a temperate paradise amid the land of snows. Perfect health is the norm, and inhabitants live to very old age while maintaining a youthful appearance.
The newcomers quickly adjust to life in Shangri-La, especially Richard Conway (Peter Finch
Peter Finch
Peter Finch was a British-born Australian actor. He is best remembered for his role as "crazed" television anchorman Howard Beale in the film Network, which earned him a posthumous Academy Award for Best Actor, his fifth Best Actor award from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, and a...
), the group's leader. He meets and falls in love with Catherine (Liv Ullmann
Liv Ullmann
Liv Johanne Ullmann is a Norwegian actress and film director, as well as one of the "muses" of the Swedish director Ingmar Bergman...
), a school teacher. Sally Hughes (Sally Kellerman
Sally Kellerman
Sally Clare Kellerman is an American actress and singer known for her role as Major Margaret "Hot Lips" Houlihan in the film MASH , for which she was nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress in a Supporting Role.-Early life:...
), a drug-addicted Newsweek
Newsweek
Newsweek is an American weekly news magazine published in New York City. It is distributed throughout the United States and internationally. It is the second-largest news weekly magazine in the U.S., having trailed Time in circulation and advertising revenue for most of its existence...
photographer is suicidal at first, but begins counselling with lamas Chang (John Gielgud
John Gielgud
Sir Arthur John Gielgud, OM, CH was an English actor, director, and producer. A descendant of the renowned Terry acting family, he achieved early international acclaim for his youthful, emotionally expressive Hamlet which broke box office records on Broadway in 1937...
) and To Len (James Shigeta
James Shigeta
James Shigeta is an American film and television actor. He is also a standards singer, musical theatre and nightclub performer, and recording artist. He is a Nisei or second-generation American of Japanese ancestry.-Early life:...
) and discovers a new lease of life. Sam Cornelius (George Kennedy
George Kennedy
George Harris Kennedy, Jr. is an American actor who has appeared in over 200 film and television productions. He is perhaps most familiar as the convict Dragline in Cool Hand Luke , airline troubleshooter Joe Patroni in the Airport series of disaster movies from the 1970s and...
) discovers gold, but Sally convinces him to use his engineering skills to bring better irrigation to the famers of Shangri-La instead of attempting to smuggle the gold out. Harry Lovett (Bobby Van) is a third-rate comic and song and dance
Song and Dance
Song and Dance is a musical comprising two acts, one told entirely in "Song" and one entirely in "Dance", tied together by a love story.The first part is Tell Me On A Sunday, with lyrics by Don Black and music by Andrew Lloyd Webber, about a young British woman's romantic misadventures in New York...
man who discovers he has a flair for working with the children of Shangri-La. Everyone is content to stay except Conway's younger brother, George (Michael York
Michael York (actor)
Michael York, OBE is an English actor.-Early life:York was born in Fulmer, Gerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire, the son of Florence Edith May , a musician; and Joseph Gwynne Johnson, a Llandovery born Welsh ex-Royal Artillery British Army officer and executive with Marks and Spencer department stores...
). George has fallen in love with Maria (Olivia Hussey
Olivia Hussey
Olivia Hussey is an Argentinian actress who became famous for her role as Juliet in Franco Zeffirelli's Academy Award-winning 1968 film version of Romeo and Juliet. For this role she won the Golden Globe Award for New Star of the Year - Actress as well as the David di Donatello for best actress...
), a dancer, and wants to take her with him when he leaves. Chang warns Richard that Maria came to Shangri-La over eighty years before, at the age of twenty. If she were to leave the valley she would quickly revert to her actual age.
Richard is summoned to meet the High Lama (Charles Boyer
Charles Boyer
Charles Boyer was a French actor who appeared in more than 80 films between 1920 and 1976. After receiving an education in drama, Boyer started on the stage, but he found success in movies during the 1930s. His memorable performances were among the era's most highly praised romantic dramas,...
), who informs him that he was brought there for a reason, to take over the leadership of the community when he himself dies. However, the night that the High Lama dies, George and Maria tell Richard that everything the High Lama and Chang have said is a lie, and convince him to leave with them immediately. Richard is still in shock from the High Lama's death, and leaves without even saying goodbye to Catherine. Not long after their departure Maria suddenly ages and dies, and George falls to his death down an icy ravine. Richard struggles on alone, ending up in a hospital bed in the Himalayan foothills. He runs away, back to the mountains, and miraculously finds the portal to Shangri-La once more.
Critical reception
Lost Horizon is considered one of the last in a string of box office musical failures which came in the wake of the success of The Sound of MusicThe Sound of Music (film)
Rodgers and Hammerstein's The Sound of Music is a 1965 American musical film directed by Robert Wise and starring Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer. The film is based on the Broadway musical The Sound of Music, with songs written by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II, and with the musical...
. Attempts to update the idea of Shangri-La
Shangri-La
Shangri-La is a fictional place described in the 1933 novel Lost Horizon by British author James Hilton. Hilton describes Shangri-La as a mystical, harmonious valley, gently guided from a lamasery, enclosed in the western end of the Kunlun Mountains...
with its racial inequalities intact, coupled with old-fashioned songs effectively sealed its fate. Pauline Kael
Pauline Kael
Pauline Kael was an American film critic who wrote for The New Yorker magazine from 1968 to 1991. Earlier in her career, her work appeared in City Lights, McCall's and The New Republic....
noted that Shangri-La was depicted as:
a middle-class geriatric utopiaUtopiaUtopia is an ideal community or society possessing a perfect socio-politico-legal system. The word was imported from Greek by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book Utopia, describing a fictional island in the Atlantic Ocean. The term has been used to describe both intentional communities that attempt...
[where]... you can live indefinitely, lounging and puttering about for hundreds of years... the Orientals are kept in their places, and no blacks... are among the residents. There's probably no way to rethink this material without throwing it all away.
After derided preview screenings Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production and distribution company. Columbia Pictures now forms part of the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, owned by Sony Pictures Entertainment, a subsidiary of the Japanese conglomerate Sony. It is one of the leading film companies...
re-cut the film, but to no avail. Critic John Simon
John Simon (critic)
John Ivan Simon is an American author and literary, theater, and film critic.-Personal life:Simon was born in Subotica, Bačka, County of Bačka, the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, later, known as Yugoslavia . He is of Hungarian descent...
remarked that it "must have arrived in garbage rather than in film cans". The songs were written by Burt Bacharach
Burt Bacharach
Burt F. Bacharach is an American pianist, composer and music producer. He is known for his popular hit songs and compositions from the mid-1950s through the 1980s, with lyrics written by Hal David. Many of their hits were produced specifically for, and performed by, Dionne Warwick...
and Hal David
Hal David
Harold Lane "Hal" David is an American lyricist. He grew up in Brooklyn, New York. David is best known for his collaborations with composer Burt Bacharach.-Career:...
, whose long partnership hit rocky ground within months of this film's release. The film was such a poor performer at the box office that it was nicknamed "Lost Investment." Bette Midler
Bette Midler
Bette Midler is an American singer, actress, and comedian, also known by her informal stage name, The Divine Miss M. She became famous as a cabaret and concert headliner, and went on to star in successful and acclaimed films such as The Rose, Ruthless People, Beaches, and For The Boys...
called the musical "Lost Her-Reason" and famously quipped, "I never miss a Liv Ullman musical."
(Ullman later appeared in Richard Rodgers' last Broadway musical, yet another flop for the 'Swedish nightengale,' adapted from the John Van Druten play, and dubbed "I Dismembered Mama.")
The film was selected for inclusion in the book "50 Worst Films of All Time," co-written by film critic Michael Medved.
However Peter Finch has said he enjoyed making the film.
Screenplay
Larry Kramer has publicly acknowledged that he's not particularly proud of his workmanlike job adapting the original film-script for this film. However, hot on the heels of Kramer's Oscar-nomination for the screenplay for Women in LoveWomen in Love (film)
Women in Love is a 1969 British film directed by Ken Russell. It stars Alan Bates , Oliver Reed, Glenda Jackson and Jennie Linden. The film was adapted by Larry Kramer from the novel of the same name by D. H. Lawrence....
, the deal he engineered for this, combined with savvy investments, made it possible for him to live the rest of his creative life free of financial worries. In that sense, this film enabled Kramer to devote himself to the gay community activism and the writings (e.g., his ground-breaking AIDS play, The Normal Heart
The Normal Heart
The Normal Heart is a largely autobiographical play by Larry Kramer. It focuses on the rise of the HIV-AIDS crisis in New York City between 1981 and 1984, as seen through the eyes of writer/activist Ned Weeks, the gay Jewish-American founder of a prominent HIV advocacy group...
) which came later.
Soundtrack
The soundtrack was moderately more successful than the film, peaking at #56 on the Billboard Hot 200. The title song was performed by Shawn PhillipsShawn Phillips
Shawn Phillips is a folk-rock musician, primarily influential in the 1960s and 1970s.Phillips has recorded twenty albums and worked with musicians including Donovan, Paul Buckmaster, J. Peter Robinson, Eric Clapton, Steve Winwood, Bernie Taupin, and many others...
.
Of the lead actors, only Sally Kellerman
Sally Kellerman
Sally Clare Kellerman is an American actress and singer known for her role as Major Margaret "Hot Lips" Houlihan in the film MASH , for which she was nominated for an Oscar for Best Actress in a Supporting Role.-Early life:...
, Bobby Van, and James Shigeta
James Shigeta
James Shigeta is an American film and television actor. He is also a standards singer, musical theatre and nightclub performer, and recording artist. He is a Nisei or second-generation American of Japanese ancestry.-Early life:...
perform their own singing. Olivia Hussey
Olivia Hussey
Olivia Hussey is an Argentinian actress who became famous for her role as Juliet in Franco Zeffirelli's Academy Award-winning 1968 film version of Romeo and Juliet. For this role she won the Golden Globe Award for New Star of the Year - Actress as well as the David di Donatello for best actress...
, Peter Finch
Peter Finch
Peter Finch was a British-born Australian actor. He is best remembered for his role as "crazed" television anchorman Howard Beale in the film Network, which earned him a posthumous Academy Award for Best Actor, his fifth Best Actor award from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, and a...
and Liv Ullman were dubbed by Andra Willis
Andra Willis
Andra Willis is an American singer best known from television's The Lawrence Welk Show from 1967 to 1969.Born and raised in Danville, Virginia. Andra began singing professionally with her sisters Toneda and Sheryl...
, Jerry Whitman, and Diana Lee
Diana Lee
Diana Lee or Diana Lee-Hsu is an American model and actress. She was chosen as Playboy's Playmate of the Month for May 1988. Her centerfold was photographed by Stephen Wayda and Richard Fegley....
respectively. The song "Living Together, Growing Together" was a minor hit for The 5th Dimension. The song "Things I Will Not Miss" was covered by Diana Ross
Diana Ross
Diana Ernestine Earle Ross is an American singer, record producer, and actress. Ross was lead singer of the Motown group The Supremes during the 1960s. After leaving the group in 1970, Ross began a solo career that included successful ventures into film and Broadway...
and Marvin Gaye
Marvin Gaye
Marvin Pentz Gay, Jr. , better known by his stage name Marvin Gaye, was an American singer-songwriter and musician with a three-octave vocal range....
during recording sessions for the 1973 album Diana and Marvin.
Songs
- "Lost Horizon" (sung by Shawn Phillips over the opening and closing credits)
- "Share The Joy" (Maria)
- "The World Is A Circle" (Catherine)
- "Living Together, Growing Together" (To Len and Company)
- "I Might Frighten Her Away" (Richard and Catherine)
- "The Things I Will Not Miss" (Sally and Maria)
- "If I Could Go Back" (Richard)
- "Where Knowledge Ends" (Faith Begins)" (Catherine)
- "Reflections" (Sally)
- "Question Me An Answer" (Harry)
- "I Come To You" (Richard)
Large parts of the score were deleted after the film's road show
Roadshow theatrical release
A roadshow theatrical release was a term in the American motion picture industry for a practice in which a film opened in a limited number of theaters in large cities like Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Houston, Atlanta, Dallas, and San Francisco for a specific period of time before the...
release. The dance sections of "Living Together, Growing Together" were cut, and the master negatives lost. "If I Could Go Back", "Where Knowledge Ends (Faith Begins)", and "I Come To You" were cut, but restored for the laserdisc
Laserdisc
LaserDisc was a home video format and the first commercial optical disc storage medium. Initially licensed, sold, and marketed as MCA DiscoVision in North America in 1978, the technology was previously referred to interally as Optical Videodisc System, Reflective Optical Videodisc, Laser Optical...
release of the film. All of the songs appear on the soundtrack LP and CD. According to the notes on the laserdisc release, Kellerman and Kennedy had a reprise of "Living Together, Growing Together" that was also lost.
DVD Release
On October 11, 2011, Columbia Classics, the Manufactured on Demand unit of Columbia Pictures Home Video, released a fully restored version of the film on DVD, which reinstated all of the elements cut after the roadshow release. The DVD also contains supplemental features, including promos featuring producer Ross Hunter as well as the original song demos played and sung by composer Burt Bacharach. Some of these demos contain different Hal David lyrics than the final versions utilized in the film.External links
- www.LostHorizon.org information about the book, movie, and real life Shangri-Las.
- Film Threat -Truth In Entertainment Modern critical commentary on the film.