Rediscover This Hidden Gem: The 35-Year-Old Adventure Film That Deserves a Second Look!

Bob Rafelson, a key figure in the New Hollywood era of the 1970s, significantly boosted the career of his friend Jack Nicholson through films like “Five Easy Pieces” and the remake of “The Postman Always Rings Twice”. Despite his influence, Rafelson was not particularly prolific, directing just eleven films over 34 years.

In 1990, he directed an extraordinary adventure film: “Mountains of the Moon”. A type of film that had not been made for decades, until James Gray reignited the genre with “The Lost City of Z”, which unfortunately also suffered a painful and harsh failure at the box office.

The true story begins in 1854. Two men meet in Aden: Richard Burton, an adventurer (notably the first Westerner to clandestinely enter the holy city of Mecca, an act punishable by death at the time), poet, ethnologist, and translator of erotic texts; and John Hanning Speke, driven by wild ambition. In London, they decide to return to Africa to solve a mystery that had long intrigued the English: to find the exact source of the Nile River.

Here’s the trailer…

The idea of making a film about these two legendary explorers actually dates back to the late 1960s, with Franklin J. Schaffner at the helm. It ultimately took until the 1982 publication of the biography Burton & Speke by William Harrison for the project to get back on track.

Immersed in the stunning cinematography by Roger Deakins, “Mountains of the Moon” is a vibrant, moving, and even harsh tale; a story of friendship but also of rivalry, brought to life by a fantastic pair of actors. Patrick Bergin, portraying Richard Burton, and Iain Glen, absolutely perfect as John Hanning Speke. Glen is well-known to fans of Game of Thrones, where he played Jorah Mormont.

Aside from an antique VHS, this film has never been released on DVD in our region, let alone Blu-ray. Perhaps the terrible and deeply unfair box office failure of the film, which garnered only $4 million internationally (highlighting the severity of the flop), has something to do with it?

We thus issue a heartfelt plea to any publisher willing to release this great adventure film, which would undoubtedly gain from wider recognition, judging by the mere 146 ratings it has on its record…