Elephant Boy

1937
Approved
1h 20m

IMDb RATING

6.4/10

875

YOUR RATING

Adventure Drama Family

This black and white movie is based on Rudyard Kipling's "Toomai, of the Elephants", in which a small native lad claims he knows the congregating place of the elephant hordes.This black and white movie is based on Rudyard Kipling's "Toomai, of the Elephants", in which a small native lad claims he knows the congregating place of the elephant hordes.This black and white movie is based on Rudyard Kipling's "Toomai, of the Elephants", in which a small native lad claims he knows the congregating place of the elephant hordes.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

6.4/10

875

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

Awards
- 2 wins & 1 nomination

Photos47

+ 39

Top cast10

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Sabu

Toomai

W.E. Holloway

Father

Walter Hudd

Petersen

Allan Jeayes

Machua Appa

Bruce Gordon

Rham Lahl

D.J. Williams

Hunter

Wilfrid Hyde-White

Commissioner
(as Hyde White)

Iravatha

Kala Nag
(uncredited)

Harry Lane

Bit Part
(uncredited)

Udham Singh

Man in crowd
(uncredited)

Storyline

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Did you know

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Trivia
Korda had read and been so impressed Kipling's 'Toomai of the Elephants', that when documentary director Robert Flaherty came to him for backing, he readily gave it to him and sent him to India in February 1935. After over a year with nothing productive been done, Korda sent director Monta Bell to help out. and then Zolta Korda. By Summer 1936, with over 55 hours of background footage and still no story, the crew were brought back to Denham Studios . Writer John Collier was brought in to produce a simple script for Zoltan to shoot in the studios and on location on the River Colne.

Connections
Featured in Family Classics: Family Classics: Elephant Boy (1963)

User reviews14

Review

Featured review

7/10

Docu-drama that comes off surprisingly well

In India, an elephant boy (Sabu) wants to become a great man like his father and helps a British colonial conservationist (Walter Hudd) find and herd elephants.

A film project that began with producer Alexander Korda sending the great documentary filmmaker Robert J. Flaherty to the Mysore region of India to film for an Empire project. The result was 55 hours of geographic documentary footage, but no discernible narrative. Zoltan Korda took over, brought the production back to England and filmed a narrative around Rudyard Kipling's story, 'Toomei of the Elephants'. Much of Flaherty's footage is used in the film, but incongruously also sits beside some poor obvious fake elephant feet as in the 'Dance of the elephants' sequence. Nevertheless, both as a docudrama and a narrative film it comes off surprisingly well. One of Flaherty's other contributions was the discovery of Sabu who became a star after this film.