Chang was the brainchild of the producer/director team of Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack, who gained immortality by giving the world King Kong. Chang came a few years earlier, in 1927. A curious mix of stunning wilderness imagery and cornball theatrics (the awful title cards, which veer from the purplest of prose to jokey lines supposedly uttered by bears and monkeys, are credited to one Achmed Abdullah), the movie definitely delivers the thrills it promises, with tiger hunts and elephant stampedes to spare. There's not much of a story -- the brave "Pioneer without a Covered Wagon" and his family fight off the animals that threaten them, sometimes getting help from a nearby village -- and a lot of the attitudes are outdated. Regardless, as travelogue, as jungle adventure, and especially as a slice of film history, the movie is worth a look.
Tabu is worth a great deal more than that. Filmed in the South Seas between 1929-1931, it was intended as a team-up between F. W. Murnau and documentarian Robert J. Flaherty, but Murnau quickly took over the project. The result is a masterpiece. Matahi is a strapping, perpetually eager young man; Reri is his beautiful lover. When Reri is declared a sacred maiden, all men are forbidden to even gaze upon her. Matahi rebels, absconds with Reri, and the two run off to one of the white-ruled islands, to a whole new world of bar bills, debts, and crooked officials, but with an elderly warrior hot on their trail. The film is so perfectly composed, it's a pleasure to watch every scene; the film's genius is apparent in everything you see.
