Ustinov's scenes are all on one studio interior set plus a quick scene at an airport.
Taylor's scenes are all on studio interior sets plus a quick scene at an airport and 2 quick scenes at a beachside road.
It seems it the exteriors were shot in Dahomey and in the hills of the Côte d'Azur in France
According to Burton's diary, everyone was in Benin (Dahomey).
And it was bloody hot.
^
Ah, last week I looked at Ustinov's 'authorised biography' (which is a disappointing volume, I must say).
It also mentions that Ustinov went on location. But still I do think this is an awkward, unconvincing piece of cinema.
My expectations were very low, so I enjoyed it more than I expected. Boiler plate Graham Greene. I am reading Burton's diaries and it's quite enjoyable. He hated Georg Stanford Brown, but loves Jimmy Jones. He is a big fan of Ustinov's. He also likes Taylor, but I have a feeling that will change.
Jimmy Jones, indeed.
There is a great part of the diaries where Burton and Taylor meet the President of Dahomey while on location. The President shows off his presidential estate, but it pales next to anything he and Taylor own. He feels conflicted and self-conscious about it, then reprimands himself (and the other actors) for making jokes about the discrepancy, rather than trying to make sense out of how it really makes them feel. "We British are cold fish" he says.
I do agree the studio sets look relatively awful. Actually, they look like every typical movie in this era, but the exteriors, most car scenes, and even the airport (inside, but you can see out) looked lovely, and much more in the spirit of the film. Would have liked it if they had filmed everything on location, and lit the interiors realistically.
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