Champagne Safari

Photographed and produced by both Jackson Leighter...and his wife...and, while not wishing to disillusion those who state this has only been seen at film festivals, this clinker of a travelogue was booked and seen in thousands of theatres in 1954. It follows Rita Hayworth and Prince Aly Kahn---with all the production value of a home-movie made by Joe Blow---through their wedding trip, which started at the long-lost city of Pompeii, Italy, preceded to Athens and then to Cairo.They and their retinue move up the Nile to Luxor and into the African domain of Aly's father, the Aga Kahn---quick, add him to the cast---spiritual leader of millions of Ismaelis. Then onward to Uganda, Tanganyika, and into the Congo. Those expecting to see intimate views of the royal couple are in for a disappointment...they do not even get as cozy as a hand-shake. Rita would have been well-advised to have asked Harry Cohn for the loan of some of Columbia's make-up people.