Long before the movie Deliverance introduced whitewater boating (and other, less wholesome activities) to the masses, there was the African Queen.
Featuring Katharine Hepburn and Humphrey Bogart, the 1951 classic adventure flick depicts an unlikely pair – a heavy drinking boat captain and a prim missionary – navigating treacherous African rivers on their way to sink a German warship.
If you haven’t seen the movie, it’s worth watching. It’s great adventure flick, complete with steep rivers, crocodiles, leeches, and a quirky romance. The American Film Institute rates it high among the top 100 films of all time. And I’m wondering if it was first film to depict whitewater boating…
Even if you’ve seen the movie before, it was restored and released this March for the first time on DVD 
In one scene, Bogart’s churlish character, Charlie Allnut, thinks the first set of rapids have intimidated Hepburn’s character, Rose Sayer.
After the rapids, Charlie is smug, sure that Rose was terrified by the river.
“How’d you like it?” he asks.
“Like it?”
“Whitewater rapids!”
“I never dreamed…,” Rose says.
“I don’t blame you for being scared – not one bit,” Charlies says. “Nobody with good sense ain’t scared of white water…”
“I never dreamed,” Rose says, “that any mere physical experience could be so stimulating!”
Turns out Rose is a bad ass. In fact, the whole escapade down the river is her idea.
Almost as interesting as the movie is the hour-long extra feature documentary about the making of the film. It was shot on-location in central Africa, which was rare for the time and made for an adventure of its own.
Juicy anecdotes abound. The crew all got sick from the water – except for Bogart and director John Huston, who only drank liquor. While shooting they towed a special floating toilet down the river for Hepburn. Huston disappeared for a while to go elephant hunting (and came back with dubious tales of a murderous cook who secretly fed them human flesh). Good stuff.
Here’s the trailer:
