Shangri-La looks like a cross between Mt. Olympus and Beverly Hills!

As a kid growing up in the 1970’s I remember hearing Frank Capra’s Lost Horizon referred to as the Holy Grail of lost movies. What happened was every time the movie was reissued over the years more of it was cut out until by 1967 only a very truncated version remained. In 1973 the AFI launched an exhaustive world wide search to find the missing footage. Eventually the entire audio recording was discovered and all but 7 minutes of the 132 minute film. The restored version uses still photographs to fill in for the few brief scenes that were never found.

Based on a highly popular book of the 1930’s by James Hilton, Lost Horizon is a spectacular adventure tale best enjoyed without too much prior knowledge of its story.

It begins in a small city in China where Robert Conway, a highly regarded British diplomat, is overseeing the evacuation of 90 westerners as a bloody local rebellion is taking place. He winds up on a plane with his younger brother George and three other passengers, two men and a woman. Unbeknownst to them the plane has been hijacked and instead of flying east to Shanghai they are heading west towards Tibet.

The next day, after they discover they are traveling in the wrong direction, the plane makes a stop for refueling. None of the passengers are allowed to disembark and they continue on their way towards the Himalayas. They crash land high up in the snow covered peaks of the world’s tallest mountain range. The pilot is discovered dead from the crash. Just as the five remaining passengers are deciding what their next move will be they notice a group of people approaching from a path over the mountains.

Intriguing isn’t it!?

Of course they find themselves in the utopian land of Shangri-La. It is a place cut off completely from the outside world, where there is no crime or disease and people never grow old. The mysteries of Shangri-La are slowly revealed as we meet its enigmatic inhabitants. It is a place of beauty and high ideals that in appearance is a cross between Mount Olympus and Beverly Hills.

All of the passengers adjust to life in their new surroundings except for kid brother George. He is determined to get back to civilization. If you want to know how the story unfolds the rest of the way you will have to watch the movie because I’m not going to give it away. I will just say that the ending is entirely satisfying.

The cast is lead by the debonair Ronald Colman and the dashing John Howard as the Conway brothers Robert and George. Ubiquitous character actors Thomas Mitchell and Edward Everett Horton play the other two male passengers. They quickly develop a joking camaraderie with Mitchell making fun of the effeminate Horton in a playful manner. He calls him affectionate nicknames like “sister”, “Lovey” and “Toots” throughout the movie.

Isabel Jewell (best remembered for playing the poor white trash Emmy Slattery in GWTW) plays the female passenger, Gloria. She is dying of tuberculosis and has already outlived her prognosis by six months. She gets a couple of dramatic scenes that she overacts superbly. After they crash and are faced with certain death she laughs hysterically and tells the others, “I’m going to enjoy watching you guys squirm for a change!”

H.B Warner, Sam Jaffe, Jane Wyatt and the actress known simply as Margo round out the cast as the blissful citizens of Shangri-La.

Lost Horizon is an epic in every sense of the word. It was expensive to make and took a long time to shoot. It tells a wonderful story filled with adventure and majesty and it surely ranks among the greatest movies ever to come out of Hollywood’s Golden Age. The restored version is an absolute must see!
 

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