One of the first documentaries ever filmed and drinks two for one! What’s not to like?
In 1925, eight years before Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack unleashed King Kong on the moviegoing public, they began filming a very different movie, mostly deep in the jungle between Laos (then Lan Xang) and Thailand (then Siam).
Chang: A Drama of the Wilderness, a silent action-adventure film masquerading as a documentary, was made without actors or trained animals. The cast was made up of Lao villagers and untamed jungle animals, including a tiger, a leopard, and a herd of elephants.
The 60-minute film focuses on the life of a Lao carpenter named Kru, his wife Chantui, son Nah, and daughter Ladah, and their daily struggle for survival. (The actors weren’t related but became a family for the movie.) We see Kru and his people hunting tigers, luring leopards into hidden pits, and trapping and attempting to domesticate a herd of elephants.
