April 4, 2022

David Farrar is "Parker", a man trying to bring some sense of law and order to a diamond mining community in pre-colonial South Africa. Most of his fellow citizens welcome his proposals save for "Muller" (Niall MacGinnis). The former wins a concession from the local chief to mine and export the diamonds after a bit of fisticuffs with his nemesis, but that just serves to sow the seeds for the constant undermining of his ideals until a final denoue… read the rest.

David Farrar is "Parker", a man trying to bring some sense of law and order to a diamond mining community in pre-colonial South Africa. Most of his fellow citizens welcome his proposals save for "Muller" (Niall MacGinnis). The former wins a concession from the local chief to mine and export the diamonds after a bit of fisticuffs with his nemesis, but that just serves to sow the seeds for the constant undermining of his ideals until a final denouement with both men fighting for their lives, and for control of "Hopetown". Filmed on location, it looks quite good but the adventure elements are all too often dragged into melodrama by the romantic ones. Diana Dors ("Dora" - who does a decent on-stage number here) and Honor Blackman ("Mary") find themselves the object of not just the desires of "Parker" but of his friend "David" (Andrew Crawford) and there is a touch of bible-based do-gooding from Mervyn Johns to further clutter up the narrative. The script is very wordy at times, and I could have done with a better lit production too. Farrar tries his best here, but sadly this is just another routine, and pretty forgettable, effort from all concerned.

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