JAMES DEAN: RACE WITH DESTINY (aka JAMES DEAN: LIVE FAST, DIE YOUNG)

 

Publicity poster for the special uncut version of James Dean: Race With Destiny, aka James Dean: Live Fast, Die Young (© Mardi Rustam/MARS Productions Corporation/Cheeni Productions/Highland Pictures/Prism Leisure Corp – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

As I previously revealed on Shuker In MovieLand via my biographical article of his life and career (click here to access it), I've always been a huge James Dean fan, I was a longstanding member of WRDI (We Remember Dean International, now sadly defunct), and I own a mini-library of over 60 books devoted to him, all three of his major movies on DVD and video, plus all of his TV appearances on video, video/DVD documentaries about him, an array of JD memorabilia, soundtrack albums of his movies, etc etc – you get the picture.

Surprisingly, however, I'd never seen an actual movie based upon Jimmy's life, with another actor playing him – until 15 January 2021, that is, when I finally watched one such movie. Namely, James Dean: Race With Destiny (aka James Dean: Live Fast, Die Young).

Produced and directed by Mardi Rustam, released in 1997, and starring Casper Van Dien as Jimmy, James Dean: Race With Destiny focuses upon the most significant (yet all too brief) section of his life, spanning his three movies – East of Eden (1955 – Jimmy's only movie that he lived to see released), Rebel Without a Cause (1955), and Giant (1956 – directed by George Stevens, played here by Robert Mitchum in what proved to be his final acting role).

This particular period of Jimmy's life was also notable for his doomed love affair with Italian-born actress Pier Angeli (played by Robert's granddaughter Carrie Mitchum, alongside Diane Ladd as Pier's disapproving mother, and Louis D'Alto as ballad singer Vic Damone whom Pier was deftly coerced by her mother into marrying instead of Jimmy), and culminated in that fateful day, 30 September 1955, when while driving his Porsche Spyder racing car to a race meeting in Salinas, California, after having completed filming on Giant just a fortnight earlier, Jimmy was tragically killed in a horrific car crash. He was just 24 years old, but was granted immortality by virtue of his genius and the cruel cutting short of his life, transforming him into an everlasting legend.

Casper captures Jimmy's idiosyncratic mannerisms, mercurial nature, and passionate vitality very effectively, and looks a great deal like him too (perhaps a little too much chin, but otherwise possessing persuasive verisimilitude). Moreover, it was fascinating for me to watch the key episodes of Jimmy's life – which I've read so much about, and with which I was therefore already so familiar – materialize before my very eyes on screen, whereas until now they had only done so in my mind.

Happily, these episodes are presented in a generally faithful manner, restricting to a minimum the potentially misleading and in my opinion entirely unnecessary 'factional' elements (i.e. invented scenes and fictitious characters) that all-too-frequently nowadays extensively pervade supposedly factual biopics – to the point, in fact, where they seem veritable prerequisites for any movie in this particular genre.

Also highly deserving of mention is this movie's distinctive music score, which includes no fewer than 14 memorable songs written especially for it by Gordon Waller and Jim Blazer (plus one by its director, Mardi Rustam), and which embrace the embryonic rock'n'roll style characterising the time period being portrayed here.

James Dean: Race With Destiny is an engaging biopic of an enigmatic and truly iconic star – who knows to what even greater heights of fame and success Jimmy may have ascended, had he lived? An extremely sad, unique loss to moviedom and beyond, but at least we can be very thankful that Jimmy's films and TV shows remain, to remind us forever of what he was and to tantalise us for all time with what he may have become.

If you'd like to catch a sneak preview of this fascinating film, please click here to watch an official trailer for it on YouTube. And if you'd like to view the entire movie, it is presently available to watch for free here on YouTube.

And to view a complete listing of all of my Shuker In MovieLand blog's other film reviews and articles (each one instantly accessible via a direct clickable link), please click HERE!

 

RAMPAGE (1963) - DISENCHANTED BY THE ENCHANTRESS

 

The official DVD of the 1963 movie Rampage (© Phil Karlson/Seven Arts Productions/Warner Bros. – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

Focusing predominantly upon the movie itself, this Shuker In MovieLand review is a modified, updated version of my lengthier, cryptozoologically-themed article that I uploaded to my ShukerNature blog on 16 March 2011 (please click here to access that original version of it).

Also, please note that the Rampage movie documented here, released in 1963 and based upon a novel (see below), is entirely different in storyline and origin from all of the five subsequent films that share the same title, including the CGI-replete monster movie of 2018. Based upon a video game, that last-mentioned movie is one that I keep intending to review here on Shuker In MovieLand after having watched and enjoyed it some months ago – so watch this space! Meanwhile, back to the 1963 Rampage…

It was over 23 years ago when English zoologist Clinton Keeling inserted the following note in the October 1997 issue of his quarterly magazine Mainly About Animals:

Although its title now escapes me, I recall a film, made in the 1960s and supposedly set in a German zoological garden and the town or city in which it was situated, that primarily concerned the arrival and subsequent escape of a much-sought-after new arrival called an Enchantress. Certainly it looked like nothing on earth, as some powder or lotion had been worked into its fur to give it a shimmering effect of glowing orange - yet it was only an ordinary Jaguar. Does anyone else remember this film, plus its name?

No-one answered his enquiry, and in spite of some diligent researches of my own since then, I had never able to identify this film either – until Spencer joined in the search.

On the afternoon of 15 March 2011, I happened to mention the Enchantress casually in passing while chatting over the telephone with longstanding friend and fellow cryptozoology enthusiast Spencer Thrower. Spencer has an extraordinary gift for uncovering obscure information online, and I could tell from his comments and the tone of his voice that he was very intrigued by the Enchantress and keen to begin investigating the case himself on my behalf. But would he succeed? Silly question, really, because less than half an hour later he phoned back in triumph, having not only tracked down and identified the movie in question, but also obtained a list of its stars, a detailed plot synopsis, and even a couple of full-colour posters illustrating the elusive Enchantress!

The movie was an American adventure film entitled Rampage, which was directed by Phil Karlson, shot mostly in Hawaii, contained music by Elmer Bernstein, and released in Technicolor by Warner Brothers in 1963. Based upon the 1961 novel of the same title by Alan Caillou, it stars Robert Mitchum as big game trapper Harry Stanton, Jack Hawkins as professional hunter Otto Abbot, Elsa Martinelli as Otto’s mistress, Anna, and Sabu as a native helper. The film’s basic plot is as follows.

SPOILER ALERT – please skip the next two paragraphs, highlighted in red for your convenience, if you want to watch this movie without knowing its storyline in advance.

 

Publicity poster for the 1963 movie Rampage (© Phil Karlson/Seven Arts Productions/Warner Bros. – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

Harry is commissioned by a zoo in what was then West Germany to capture in the Malay jungle an ultra-rare type of big cat, claimed to be a hybrid of tiger and leopard, and known locally as the Enchantress. He is accompanied by Otto and Anna. Various rivalries begin between the two men, but when Otto traps the Enchantress in a cave and is badly mauled by it, Harry comes to his rescue, and captures the big cat.

Back in Germany, Harry transports the Enchantress to its zoo destination via freight train, but Otto, jealous of how close Harry and Anna have become, releases the big cat while Harry is alone with it. Happily, however, he manages to escape its clutches, after which the Enchantress leaps from the train. After killing a janitor, it is subsequently cornered by Otto, who then witnesses the arrival of Harry and Anna, and attempts unsuccessfully to shoot Harry, but in so doing he renders himself vulnerable to the highly unstable Enchantress, who kills him before being shot itself by Anna.

At the time of posting the original version of this article to my ShukerNature blog on 16 March 2011, I had yet to locate a copy of this movie to watch, so I couldn't describe or comment upon what the late Clinton Keeling had said about the Enchantress’s unusual colouration. Judging from various posters for the movie that I had seen, however, it resembled a normal leopard in background colouration, but its rosettes were more like the juvenile patterning exhibited by young cubs of such felids as the lion and the puma.

Meanwhile, after Spencer had identified the movie and the original Alan Caillou novel, I was swiftly able to purchase a copy of the latter. However, I was surprised to discover that in the novel the cat was not a tiger-leopard hybrid with shimmering coat, and was not even referred to as the Enchantress. It was merely a nameless (albeit very large) black panther (melanistic leopard). Clearly, then, its hybrid identity, distinctive coat, and name were all changes that had been thought up by the film makers specifically for the film, presumably to make the creature seem even more exotic.

After a while, I also succeeded in tracking down and purchasing online the official Warner Bros DVD of Rampage, and on 28 May 2011 I was finally able to sit back and watch it in order to catch sight at long last of the enigmatic Enchantress – only to be extremely disenchanted by what I saw. I'd previously been informed by contacts in the movie world that the cat taking the role of the Enchantress was a very burly leopard, but in agreement with Clinton, it looked like a jaguar to me – and indeed, I later discovered that it was a jaguar named Raunchy, owned by Hollywood animal trainer Ralph Helfer.

Moreover, the shimmering glow of this felid's coat as claimed by Clinton was conspicuous only by its absence, except for the faintest hue afforded it by the flames of a fiery torch brandished at the cat by Harry during a scene in which he pursued it inside a dark cave. Again, I later learnt that some pink pigment had apparently been rubbed on to its back to make its fur glow, but there didn’t seem much evidence that this had been successful as far as I could tell from my viewing of the movie. Just as beauty is the eye of the beholder, so too, it would seem, is the Enchantress’s shimmer!

In any event, although the Enchantress is fictitious, at least one report of a seemingly genuine tiger-leopard hybrid encountered in the wild has been documented. And a supposed black panther x tiger hybrid was bred in captivity. Click here to read my descriptions of these two animals on ShukerNature.

If you'd like to watch Rampage, the full movie is now currently available to watch for free on YouTube, so just click here if you wish to do so while it is still there.

And to view a complete listing of all of my Shuker In MovieLand blog's other film reviews and articles (each one instantly accessible via a direct clickable link), please click HERE! 

My sincere thanks go to the late Clinton Keeling for first bringing the Enchantress to my attention via his magazine, and to Spencer Thrower for so ably assisting me in tracing the movie in which it appeared – cheers Spence!

 

Spencer Thrower with my copy of Alan Caillou's novel Rampage (© Dr Karl Shuker)