Evengyny Thanks for the memories!

Mjeteconer Just perfect...

Pluskylang Great Film overall

AnhartLinkin This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

evanston_dad This creaky "docu-drama" is pretty difficult to enjoy from a 21st Century vantage point.It chronicles the efforts of one family in what in 1927 was still Siam to survive in the wilds of the jungle. But the film demonizes the natural world, and particularly the animals who live in it, to the point that the family seems to be winning some sort of moral victory every time they kill a tiger or tame an elephant. It also doesn't help that most of the film is obviously staged, undermining the seriousness of this family's struggle with the jungle. All these years later, with mankind raping and exploiting the natural world out of existence, it's nearly impossible not to find this film distasteful.And I really could have done without the twee storyline (and especially the "comic relief" title cards) involving the family's pet monkey."Chang" was nominated in the one-time only category of Unique and Artistic Picture at the very first Academy Awards, but it lost, thank God, to F.W. Murnau's exquisite "Sunrise." That the two films were even nominated in the same category is hard to believe.Grade: C

CitizenCaine An impressive film in its day, Chang: A Drama of the Wilderness is about a young Siamese family trying to eke out an existence in the jungles of what is now known as Thailand. Life is a daily struggle for family as their daily needs for food and shelter are threatened, primarily by other predators. Leopards, tigers, snakes, and elephants present challenges that must be overcome. The film's highlights are the various means of ingenuity villagers employ to trap animals and the huge elephant stampede near the end of the film. The film was nominated for artistic quality of production, losing to Sunrise, in the only year the academy offered the award. The production team of Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack, who later gave us the original King Kong, filmed the entire production themselves. One wonders why they only caught scenes with the animals in them and not other threatening aspects of nature like weather. Still, the cinematography is quite impressive with natural lighting only used. Some of the shots must have been dangerous to obtain as any viewer will see. The effect of the film is undoubtedly diminished for any viewer who grew up watching Wild Kingdom with Marlin Perkins or National Geographic specials in terms of the novelty of viewing wild animals in their natural habitat. **1/2 of 4 stars.

MartinHafer I actually had very low hopes for this movie when I picked it up--it looked like a dull silent documentary about a dull group of Siamese (Thai) villagers living in the jungle. I was either expecting a dull documentary or a fake film filled with White folks dressed like Asians and stock footage instead of real action. However, I was very pleasantly surprised when the film turned out not to exactly be a documentary but had a surprisingly interesting story behind it as well as excellent writing--making this a far from dull story indeed. In addition, the film was not filmed on some back lot or crammed full of stock images, but Paramount Studios went to a lot of trouble--going to Siam and using real Siamese (not conjoined) people. And, these Asians were NOT White people acting like dumb lackeys like Charlie Chan or those in THE GOOD EARTH but real people that you cared about. So, thanks to a good story, decent characters and action as well as a sensitive portrayal in the jungle, this is an excellent film and it occasionally had a nice sense of humor. It also helped that real elephants, tigers, leopards and other animals were used--not props or stuffed animals. However, of all the animal stars, I think I liked the gibbon best--you'd have to see it to understand what I mean.For 1927, this is truly an amazing and modern film, though modern sensitivities might be aroused. PETA members will no doubt cringe when much of the plot involves hunting and killing tigers and leopards and elephants! All these scenes are amazingly realistic and given that the villagers were being killed by these critters, I could certainly understand the film--but in the 21st century, some people are bound to be shocked with the savagery of the action.

aw-komon-2 This is a thoroughly amazing and brilliant film, that strangely enough not too many of the newer film-buffs have seen, despite the universal fame of Cooper and Shoedsack due to 1933's legendary "King Kong." Actually, they were almost as famous before that. When "Chang" came out in 1927, pre-King-Kong, post-Flaherty's-Nanook and Cooper and Shoedsack's own earlier "Grass," it became one of the most popular films ever made. The reason is simple: unlike the moderately successful, equally brilliant but more national-geographic-like and meditatively paced "Grass," (plenty of people may have accidentally stumbled upon it and seen it looking for films about Marijuana!) which deals with the emigration of Persian Nomads away from the winter and towards the land that has "Grass," this one is set in the middle of a sweltering, friggin' jungle in Siam (Thailand today), amidst wild animals, and has non-stop danger and adventure from beginning to end, not to mention a hilarious sense of humor. The Thai woman in the film is actually not the spouse of Kru, the main actor, who was Cooper and Shoedsack's interpreter, but the wife of someone else living there. All these people were acting in the film without ever having seen a movie in their lives, reacting to these incredible events as they happened. Tigers, Leopards, rice farmers in the middle of a jungle running up coconaut trees to escape from them, Monkeys named Bimbo, and of course, Changs (meaning Elephants in the local language of Siam), and the big Chang/Elephant herd stampede, one of the greatest sequences ever filmed by anyone--all this is in Cooper and Shoedsack's film, which they shot all by themselves, with NO CREW, NO LIGHTING EQUIPMENT, and a 70,000 dollar budget which went up only to about 95,000 when the film took a little longer than expected, and they put some money in out of their own pockets which the studio later reimbursed. The new music by Bruce Gaston is absolutely brilliant, using a combination of traditional Thai music and modern sounds but never sounding trite or superficial. So many silent films suffer from bad, endlessly repetitive soundtracks that make you want to tear your hair out, this restored version of "Chang" on Image DVD isn't one of them. Rent it off the Internet or just go ahead and buy it, it's worth every penny, has a good transfer, an informative commentary track, and believe me, it's one of those films that you'll want to watch over and over again.