" WHEELS ACROSS INDIA " 1940 ARMAND DENIS & LEILA ROOSEVELT ASIATIC EXPEDITION DODGE TRUCKS 31564
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- čas přidán 26. 04. 2021
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This black and white 1940 travelogue film produced and directed by Armand Denis and his wife Leila Roosevelt for the Chrysler Corporation documents their 1939 expedition to Burma (now Myanmar), depicting landmarks and customs with an air of exoticism (TRT 31:48).
Titles: “Dodge Division, Chrysler Corporation presents'' over automobiles driving through rugged off-road terrain. “Wheels Across India'' (0:10). Title card: “New England. Cows graze. A white colonial style home on a well-manicured estate (0:49). Children play in a nearby pond with a small, handmade, outrigger style boat fitted with a sail. Girls watch from a meadow pan to a pair of leopards (1:28). A group of Dodge T-series trucks loaded with rooftop cargo (2:32). A stenciled car door: “Denis-Roosevelt Asiatic Expedition” (2:42). Armand Denis directs workmen in closeup (2:58). Young boys play with leopards that wear collars and leashes. A girl feeds the cats raw meat (3:33). The Denis home exterior at night. The leopards recline by fireside (4:14). Mr. Denis produces a globe and charts the course of his travels before his gathered family (4:44). A map shows India, Nepal, Burma, Ceylon. A dotted line leads from Colombo to Rangoon (now Yangon) (5:13). Shwedagon Pagoda, aka the Great Dagon Pagoda, Great Dragon Pagoda, Golden Pagoda from afar and in closeup. Statues line the base of the gilded stupa (5:34). A seated buddha and a pair of chinthes or leogryphs (5:51). Immense bamboo water wheels turn in a riverbed, irrigating rice fields. Woven paddles and bamboo buckets empty water into gutters. A villager climbs and rides the wheel (6:16). Trucks drive into Bagan, passing stupas and temples, overgrown with foliage. Touring the ancient Buddhist structures (7:49). A temple to Nāga with a stone relief sculpture arching over the doorway (8:36). A panorama of the deserted city. Our hosts survey the landscape with a Buddhist priest (8:42). A Kayan Lahwi girl wearing neck-rings poses with Leila Roosevelt. Another Kayan woman has her neck rings removed with some assistance. Armand Denis looks on, smiling (9:13). The rings are raised over her head (10:46). Girls in westernized dress carry loads suspended from their heads, their necks unadorned (10:57). Dodge trucks cross a desert landscape with a mountain range in the background (11:20). Our hosts board three boats, each carrying many native rowers, who carry paddles with their legs. Two boats appear to race (12:36). One boat capsizes. Small boats come to the rescue (13:19). Rowers paddle toward the camera, balancing on one foot expertly (14:17). Our hosts sit aboard a bamboo raft as their guides in conical hats paddle them down a placid jungle river (15:05). The jungle expedition continues on foot (15:46). Natives chop away the trunk of a tree until it is felled. A team cleans the timber (16:08). A native rides an elephant. A log is chained to the elephant, who drags it. Another elephant pushes from behind (16:37). Elephants push logs into a riverbed (18:02). Baby elephant calves (19:46). Elephants bathe in the river (20:43). Elephants are loaded with crew and cargo (22:50). A caravan makes its way through thick jungle brush (23:24). Fording a river (23:50). Having arrived at their destination village, our hosts meet with “the priestesses of the snake.” An elderly woman smokes (25:32). A native woman grinds wood into a paste and applies it to her face (25:58). Oxcarts climb a mountain trail. The party continues on foot while a man sounds a gong (26:38). The priestess carries a symbolic offering of fruit to the mouth of a cave. She scatters rice as film cameras roll (27:29). She coaxes a poisonous cobra snake until it leaps out and rushes towards her in attack. Then, she leans over the erect snake and kisses it (28:13). Review of previous scenes. Dissolve to a spinning globe and end credits (30:38).
Armand Denis was a Belgian-born documentary and ethnographic filmmaker, best known as the host of British nature programs of the 1950’s and 60’s.
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what a gem! so strange....
Fantastic!
I wouldn't trust a modern Dodge (Fiat) to drive to the next state. Amazing undertaking at the time.
There are only 3 Dodge's on sale now, Charger, Challenger and Durango. All great machines and there isn't a drop of Fiat in any of them.
@Joe Gardina Well, Fiat was the most popular car brand in my country (because commies have good relations with that company, so they bought license from them). People actually used them to made trips across Eastern Block back then. Of course Fiats had reliability issues but most of them were common, well known and easy to repair using basic tools like broom handle or pantyhose on the road.
Are there any more of these films? They did such an amazing job
UH,Those werent 4x4s? No winches, articulated suspensions? No, 44 inch tires, lift kit? We are such woosies..
At 3:37 - those aren't leopards: they're cheetahs.
I'd like to know who funded their expeditions.
Dodge you did watch it right.
@@badgerpa9 Dodge provided the vehicles as a promotional consideration, they didn't fund the entire expedition. Mfr's give cars to the television and film industry too, they don't pay for the production of the show or movie.
"Boats are toys for boys, girls are content to play with dolls"! Wow. Times have changed.
Those leopards are gorgeous. And elephants are awesome, so intelligent and social. Pity that savages still kill them just for their ivory tusks.
why did englishmen go there? for what?
Americans, actually.
Who the hell has leopards for pets? They must have taken out large life insurance policies on the kids. 🤣🤨🐱
Those were cheetah, not leopards. Only assholes have wild animals/endangered species for pets.
Three feminists died watching this video.
One liberal exploded.
Go read about Leila, she and Edna Olmsted did some groundbreaking things for the time like being the first women to accomplish some things setting world records and scandalously wearing shorts.
@@CuratorOfCurios No.
In such a conservative and old fashioned time, why did Leila use the last name Roosevelt if she was married to Armand Denis? I would not have expected that in the 1940s. That's completely opposite of the "boats are toys for boys, girls are content to play with dolls" crap.
She was FDR's cousin as well as being a well known filmmaker. I assume the last name Roosevelt was of more value for her getting funding for movie making than if she had used her husband's name.
@@sarjim4381 That makes sense.
She and Edna Olmsted were the first women to drive from Antwerp to Singapore unaccompanied by a man to chaperone them. I think I saw a newspaper clipping when I was little with a photo of her wearing shorts.(gasp! Lol)
I'm not even going to get into the whole Roosevelt family thing but either way she's related to both them just like Eleanor was. I thought she was from the Oyster Creek branch but I could be wrong.
I wish I knew more about her but I was too young to to even know what to ask or understand much when I had the chance.