Customer Reviews

Something of Value

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I have yet to see this film played on any Television cable channel. Brooks brings to the screen Robert Ruark's novel about the Mau Mau uprisings in the then British East Africa.

Its a powerful story that is well acted by Rock Hudson, Sidney Poitier, Dana Wynter and Wendy Hiller.

Here is a chance to see a terrific actor named Juano Hernandez( Young Man With a Horn, " The Pawnbroker") deliver the goods.
Time has changed attitudes on subjects like these situations portrayed here. However, parts of this drama are salient even today although framed differently. One can take the geography out of this part of Africa and transpose these types of conflicts to other continents. Directed with care by Mr. Brooks.

A sympathetic look at an armed, bloody rebellion of blacks would have been unheard of for a Hollywood film set in America in 1957. It seems that the few films that focused on race relations back then tended to present good-natured black characters being mistreated by whites who ultimately see the errors of their ways.

Perhaps that's why "Something of Value" could be filmed at all. It's set in Africa and looks at the issues of independence facing Kenya. Was that Hollywood's way of dealing with race relations in the U.S.? Imagine if MGM had released a film based on the Nat Turner slave rebellion in Virginia in colonial times.

The novel "Something of Value" had been a controversial best-seller and promised to be a controversial film. According to the new book "Tough as Nails: The Life and Films of Richard Brooks" (available from amazon.com) writer-director Brooks was a liberal who hated any kind of discrimination. He had done well with "Blackboard Jungle" a few years earlier and another controversial best-seller would be just his kind of project.

For this movie, Brooks worked again with Sidney Poitier, and Brooks also gave Rock Hudson one of the best roles of his career.

"Something of Value" doesn't make heroes of the Mau-Mau insurgents, but it explains why they were driven to violence and why Kenya ultimately would become independent.

Tough as Nails: The Life and Films of Richard Brooks (Wisconsin Film Studies)

Not having read the book on which "Something of Value" was based, I don't know how faithful the film is to the book. However, it is an evocative and provocative film. A younger Hudson portrays a white South African whose best friend is a black South African (Sidney Poitier). Having grown up together, the boys become young men subjected to the racial pressures of the MauMau era.
Hudson's character remains sympathetic throughout, and viewers will also be able to understand the coercion placed on Poitier's character because of apartheid.
Hudson doesn't get much of an opportunity to prove his acting ability, nor is Poitier's character given wide range. If one has not read the book, the conclusion of the film is not telegraphed -- those following the story for the first time will not know whether the ending will be tragic or inspiring, or whether either of the two men will survive.
All in all, it is a worthwhile movie.

i saw this when i was just a kid about 40-50 years ago, it made a very real impression and i have looked for the movie til it just surfaced recently. qualiy is good and story is one you will NEVER forget, because it is based on fact, the mau mau revolt of the 1950s.

Jaime Seattle, WA

Overall this was a well made film. It could have delved more into the organization of the mau maus and why they rose up against the white settlers like they did. I wondered how accurate the use of the whistle is when they did their home invasions.

This film is, I believe, the movie adaptation of Robert Ruark's novel of the same name and is a tale of conflict during the Mau Mau revolt in Kenya in the 1950s. I haven't read Ruark's novel, but I can't imagine that this is a very faithful adaption. Rock Hudson plays the white farmer/safari hunter, and Sidney Poitier plays the black African who grows up with Hudson as an equal and best friend, but once reaching adulthood it is clear that he will be a second class citizen. After the unjust (to Poitier's eyes at least) detention and death of his father, Poitier eventually decides to leave the white man's world and return to the wild areas of Kenya. He eventually joins, then becomes a leader in, the Mau Mau revolt. This is a movie about racism, but in America, not Africa. The backdrop of Kenya only provides a vehicle to address the issue of racism to an American audience who probably didn't want their sensitivities ruffled by too much direct criticism. In the final analysis, I found this film cliched and dull. There is almost nothing about Africa in this movie (not that there was really much about any movie on Africa made in the 50s), so don't expect to learn anything about Kenya or the Mau Mau. The issues, the interactions, and the racial tensions are all made for an American audience. This film was made long before I was born, so I can't really address what level of social impact it had. Given that it is largely forgotten today, I'm guessing almost none. This film is actually mildly insulting in that even after all the injustice against the black Africans is exposed, it is still they who must make peace on the white man's terms. The superiority of the colonial whites also oozes throughout the film, it is only a few bad apples who are causing most of the problems. This film certainly has none of the aura that `To Kill a Mockingbird' carries almost 50 years after its release. Beyond the important social themes, the story itself is fairly dull and predictable. I give this film three stars because it strikes me as an interesting, if failed, attempt to explore some of the racial injustice in the US at the time of its release. Performances by Rock Hudson and Sidney Poitier are pedestrian - they both made much better films.