GUNGA DIN (1939)--colorized

Gunga Din is a 1939 American adventure film from RKO Radio Pictures directed by George Stevens and starring Cary Grant, Victor McLaglen, and Douglas Fairbanks Jr., loosely based on the 1890 poem of the same name by Rudyard Kipling combined with elements of his 1888 short story collection Soldiers Three. The film is about three British sergeants and Gunga Din, their native bhisti (water bearer), who fight the Thuggee, an Indian murder cult, in colonial British India.

The supporting cast features Joan Fontaine, Eduardo Ciannelli, and in the title role, Sam Jaffe. The epic film was written by Joel Sayre and Fred Guiol from a storyline by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur, with uncredited contributions by Lester Cohen, John Colton, William Faulkner, Vincent Lawrence, Dudley Nichols, and Anthony Veiller.

In 1999, Gunga Din was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the United States Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.[2][3]
Plot

On the Northwest Frontier of India, circa 1880, contact has been lost with a British outpost at Tantrapur in the midst of a telegraph message. Colonel Weed dispatches a detachment of 25 British Indian Army troops to investigate, led by three sergeants of the Royal Engineers: MacChesney, Cutter, and Ballantine, long-time friends and veteran campaigners. Although they are a disciplinary headache for their colonel, they are the right men to send on a dangerous mission. Accompanying the detail are six Indian camp workers, including regimental bhisti (water carrier) Gunga Din, who longs to throw off his lowly status and become a soldier of the Queen.

They find Tantrapur apparently deserted and set about repairing the telegraph. However, they are soon surrounded by hostile locals. The troops fight their way out, taking heavy losses. Colonel Weed and Major Mitchell identify an enemy weapon brought back by the survivors as belonging to the Thuggee, a murder cult that had been suppressed 50 years previously. Weed intends to send MacChesney and Cutter back with a larger force, in order to retake the town and complete the telegraph repairs. Ballantine, however, is due to muster out of the army in a few days; Weed orders Sgt. Higginbotham, disliked by both MacChesney and Cutter, to join the expedition as Ballantine's replacement.

Once he is discharged, Ballantine plans to wed Emmy Stebbins and go into the tea business, a combined calamity that MacChesney and Cutter consider worse than death. MacChesney and Cutter are invited to the engagement party; intending to cause mischief, they spike the punch, which is subsequently drunk by Higginbotham. Higginbotham is so sick the following morning that he is unable to march out with the expedition, so a reluctant Ballantine is ordered to replace him.

At Tantrapur, Ballantine is eager to complete as much of the repairs as possible before his enlistment ends, while Cutter and MacChesney are frustrated and bored by the lack of action. Both suspect that if he could see some combat, Ballantine would change his mind about leaving the army. Ballantine's enlistment ends while the detachment is still at Tantrapur, and a relief column led by Higginbotham, with Emmy riding along to surprise Ballantine, arrives. Meanwhile, Gunga Din tells Cutter of a temple he has found, one made of gold. Cutter is determined to make his fortune, but MacChesney will have none of it and has Cutter put in the stockade to prevent his desertion. That night, Cutter escapes with Din's help and goes to the temple, which they discover belongs to the Thugs when the cultists return for a ceremony. Cutter creates a distraction and allows himself to be captured so that Din can slip away and sound the warning.

When Din gives MacChesney the news, he decides to go to the rescue, while Higginbotham sends word to headquarters to call out the entire regiment. Ballantine wants to go, too, but MacChesney points out that he cannot, as he is now a civilian. Ballantine reluctantly agrees to re-enlist, on the understanding that the enlistment paper will be torn up after the rescue. Emmy tries to dissuade him from going, but he refuses to desert his friends. MacChesney's eagerness leads him to head to the temple without questioning Din in detail. As a result, MacChesney, Ballantine, and Din foolishly enter the temple by themselves and are easily captured. They are thrown into a cell with Cutter, where they discover he has been tortured since his capture; the guru demands that they reveal the details of their regiment's location. MacChesney tricks the Thuggee guru into thinking he is prepared to betray his friends and the British army, and the soldiers use the opportunity to take the guru hostage. A standoff ensues, and the soldiers take the guru to the roof of the temple, where they discover the true size of the Thuggee forces.
Still from Gunga Din trailer showing Victor McLaglen and Cary Grant
Sam Jaffe as Gunga Din

As the regiment marches toward the temple, the guru boasts that they are falling into the trap he has set. He orders his men, still clustered around the temple, to take their positions, but they refuse to abandon him. When he sees that they are unwilling to leave him in enemy hands, he commits suicide to remove that obstacle; the Thuggee force moves into position, while other cultists swarm up the temple in order to kill the sergeants. Thugs shoot and bayonet Cutter. Gunga Din is also bayoneted, but manages with the last of his strength to climb to the top of the gold dome of the temple and sound the alarm with a bugle taken from a dead Thug. He is then shot dead, but the British force is alerted and defeats the Thuggee forces. At Din's funeral pyre, the colonel formally inducts Gunga Din as a British corporal—then he asks visiting journalist Rudyard Kipling to hand him the draft of the poem Kipling has just completed, so that he might read the final words himself over Din's body. Ballantine announces his intention to remain in the army, and instead of tearing up his re-enlistment papers, gives them to the colonel, much to the approval of MacChesney and Cutter. The film ends with a final image of Gunga Din's spirit, standing proudly and saluting at attention, now in British uniform.
Cast

Cary Grant as Sgt. Archibald Cutter
Victor McLaglen as Sgt. "Mac" MacChesney
Douglas Fairbanks Jr. as Sgt. Thomas "Tommy" Ballantine
Sam Jaffe as Gunga Din
Eduardo Ciannelli as Guru
Joan Fontaine as Emaline "Emmy" Stebbins
Montagu Love as Col. Weed
Robert Coote as Sgt. Bertie Higginbotham
Abner Biberman as Chota
Lumsden Hare as Maj. Mitchell
Cecil Kellaway as Mr. Stebbins (uncredited)
Reginald Sheffield as Rudyard Kipling (uncredited)
George Regas as Thug Chieftain "Toadface" (uncredited)
Roland Varno as Lt. Markham (uncredited)