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Lost Horizon
While escaping war-torn China, a group of Europeans crash in the Himalayas, where they are rescued and taken to the mysterious Valley of the Blue Moon, Shangri-La.
1973 · Directed by Charles Jarrott · 147 min · Adventure · Drama · Fantasy · Music · Romance · Screenplay in the scene database · 19 frames
Tagline
Come to Shangri-La! Come to a new world of music, a new world of adventure, and a new world of love!
Plot
The DC3 of a group of travellers is hijacked while fleeing a bloody revolution. The aeroplane crash-lands in an unexplored area of the Himalayas, where the party is rescued and taken to the lamasery of Shangri-La. Miraculously, Shangri-La, sheltered by mountains on all sides, is a temperate paradise amid the land of snows. Perfect health is the norm, and inhabitants live to very old age while maintaining a youthful appearance.
The newcomers quickly adjust, especially group leader and United Nations Peace Negotiator, Richard Conway. He falls in love with Catherine, a schoolteacher whose parents perished while hiking with her in the mountains. Drug addict photographer Sally Hughes is initially suicidal, but begins counseling with lamas Chang and To Len, eventually finding inner peace. Industrialist Sam Cornelius discovers gold in the local river, but Sally convinces him to use his engineering skills to bring better irrigation to the farmers of Shangri-La instead of smuggling the gold. Harry Lovett is a third-rate comic and song-and-dance man who has a flair for working with the children of Shangri-La.
Everyone is content to stay except Conway's younger brother, George. Shangri-La, despite its utopian allure, has certain expectations of its citizens. Specifically following the mantra of moderation in all things, simplicity and communal existence, as explained by Chang. George has also fallen in love with Maria, a dancer, and wants to take her along when he leaves. Chang warns Richard that Maria came to Shangri-La over 80 years ago, at the age of 20. If she were to leave the valley, she would revert to her actual age.
Plot summary from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA.
Crew
- Screenplay: Larry Kramer
- Cinematography: Robert Surtees
- Edited by: Maury Winetrobe
- Music: Burt Bacharach
- Production design: E. Preston Ames
- Produced by: Ross Hunter
Cast
- Peter Finch as Richard Conway
- Liv Ullmann as Catherine
- Sally Kellerman as Sally Hughes
- George Kennedy as Sam Cornelius
- Michael York as George Conway
- Olivia Hussey as Maria
- Bobby Van as Harry Lovett
- James Shigeta as Brother To-Lenn
- Charles Boyer as The High Lama
- John Gielgud as Chang
Production
- Country: United States of America
- Language: French, English
- Studios: Columbia Pictures, Ross Hunter Productions, Frank Capra Productions
- Budget: $5,900,000
- Box office: $3,800,000
- Themes: based on novel or book, himalaya mountain range, musical, remake, airplane crash, shangri la, sung inner thoughts
More by Charles Jarrott
On this film
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