Gunga Din (1939)

USA, 117m B&W
Director: George Stevens; Cast: Cary Grant, Victor McLaglen, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., Eduardo Ciannelli, Sam Jaffe

Gunga Din is a fictional action adventure set in late nineteenth century colonial India that was inspired by a poem by Rudyard Kipling which celebrates the heroics of Gunga Din, an Indian subject who saves British troops from massacre at the hands of a murderous group known as the Thuggee. As inspiration in later popular culture and film, there are many similarities between Gunga Din and “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom” which also employed evil Kali-worshipers at a golden temple. Perhaps most memorable homage to this film is the re-creation of Gunga Din’s inspirational bugle playing in the opening sequence in Peter Seller’s The Party (1968) (Klaus Ming May 2009).