We tuned in to Forbidden Territory on a night when we were surfing through free movies on OnDemand. We know little or nothing about the Livingstone-Stanley saga, so decided to give it a try. I don't recall ever seeing a movie production by National Geographic, so this was going to be new to us as well. We were very pleasantly surprised. The production values were topnotch, acting was fine, sets and cinematography very good. We enjoyed the story and ended by feeling that we learned something new. I nearly always check out "historical" stories and found several items confirmed by Wikipedia. There is even a portrait on Stanley's page done by his former fiancée, Alice Barney.
What pleased us most of all was the treatment of Livingstone's missionary work. We normally cringe when Hollywood gets hold of material with any sort of Christian theme, knowing that inevitably the Christian is portrayed as (in the words of Steve Taylor) "a loony or committing a crime." Not so here. There were no diatribes on the wrongfulness of wanting to bring Christianity and civilization to Africa. No not-so-subtle hints about how white men were going to destroy the indigenous culture and the environment. Thank you, National Geographic, for this little gem.
