King of the Congo

: "For the 1929 Mascot serial see The King of the Kongo, and for other uses please see Congo."Infobox Film
name = King of the Congo


image_size =
caption =
director = Spencer Gordon Bennett
Wallace Grissell
producer = Sam Katzman
writer = Royal K. Cole
Arthur Hoerl
George H. Plympton
starring = Buster Crabbe
Gloria Dea
Leonard Penn
Jack Ingram
Rick Vallin
Nick Stuart
William Fawcett
Rusty Wescoatt
music = Mischa Bakaleinikoff
cinematography = William Whitley
editing = Earl Turner
distributor = Columbia Pictures
released = Flagicon|USA May 1, 1952
runtime = 15 chapters (252 min)
country = USA
language = English - B&W
budget =
gross =
preceded_by =
followed_by =
website =
amg_id = 1:27438
imdb_id = 0044800|

"King of the Congo" (1952) was the 48th serial released by Columbia Pictures. It was based on the comic book character "Thun'Da, King of the Congo", created by Frank Frazetta.

Plot

The film series is a complicated serial with more twists than a maze that basically centers around a U.S. Air Force captain and his quest for missing microfilm that contains vital information. The heroic Buster Crabbe plays Captain Roger Drum, who shoots down an enemy plane on its way to Africa with the secret microfilm. Intent on revealing the subversive group that the message was for, Drum assumes the pilot's identity and flies to Africa himself and crashes in the jungle. He is rescued by the pacific Rock People, led by Princess Phi (Gloria Dea), and is renamed Thunda, King of the Congo, after he rings a temple gong in alarm. With the subversives believing Thunda is their missing pilot and under constant attack by another tribe called the Cave Men, our hero plots to bring down the subversives who are searching for a new metal more radioactive than uranium. At the end, Thunda (or Drum) clear the jungle of villains and reunites the Rock People and Cave Men for well.

Cast

Production

"King of the Congo" was both the last Tarzan-style serial and last serial to star Buster Crabbe. [cite book
last = Harmon
first = Jim
coauthors= Donald F. Glut
authorlink = Jim Harmon
title = The Great Movie Serials: Their Sound and Fury
origyear = 1973
publisher = Routledge
isbn = 9780713000979
pages = pp. 138
chapter = 6. Jungle "Look Out The Elephants Are Coming!" ] Crabbe starred in seven serials between 1933 and 1952.

Chapter titles

# Mission of Menace
# Red Shadows in the Jungle
# Into the Valley of Mist
# Thunda Meets His Match
# Thunda Turns the Tables
# Thunda's Desperate Charge
# Thunda Trapped
# Mission of Evil
# Menace of the Magnetic Rocks
# Lair of the Leopard
# An Ally from the Sky
# Riding Wild
# Red Raiders
# Savage Vengeance
# Judgment of the Jungle_Source: [cite book
last = Cline
first = William C.
title = In the Nick of Time
origyear = 1984
publisher = McFarland & Company, Inc.
isbn = 078640471X
pages = pp. 253
chapter = Filmography ]

Filming locations

*Iverson Ranch, Chatsworth, Los Angeles, California.

ee also

* List of film serials by year
* List of film serials by studio

References

External links

* [http://www.b-westerns.com/crabbe4.htm Buster Crabbe filmography]
* [http://ftvdb.bfi.org.uk/sift/title/39033?view=synopsis BFI - Film & TV database]
*imdb title|id=0044800|title=King of the Congo
*amg title|id=1:27438

###@@@KEY@@@###succession box
title=Columbia Serial
before= (1951)
years=King of the Congo (1952)
after=Blackhawk (1952)