Spears of Death: A weird, dusty relic of early travelogues

Is this worth your time?

Honestly? Only if you have a weird itch to see how people filmed the world a century ago. If you want a smooth, modern experience, look elsewhere. You will probably hate this if you don't have the patience for grainy footage and zero narrative structure. But if you’re into the history of cameras in the wild, you might find something here.

This isn't a movie you sit down and 'get' in the traditional sense. It’s a bunch of stuff happening in front of a lens that probably hadn't been cleaned in weeks. Wynant D. Hubbard is our guide, and he acts more like a guy who just wandered into a scene than a director.

The Eye Scene

Let's talk about the big one. There’s a moment where a hunter decides to slash his own eyes with a blade. It’s the kind of thing that makes you physically jolt in your seat. I had to rewind it twice because I genuinely couldn't believe they captured it on film.

Cinematic perspective: Exploring the visual vocabulary of Adventures in Africa No. 4: Spears of Death (1931) through its definitive frames.

It’s not stylized. It’s just... there. It’s raw, messy, and frankly, a little hard to watch. It feels like the camera operator was just as shocked as I was.

Compared to the rest

Compared to the slicker, more deliberate stuff like The Winning of Barbara Worth, this feels like it was put together with scraps of tape and luck. It’s not trying to tell a story so much as it’s trying to say, 'Look at this.' It doesn't have the polish of The Devil Horse, either. It’s just its own strange, jagged beast.

• The tribal dancing goes on for an eternity.
• The silence in the audio is sometimes louder than the actual sounds.
• I really wonder who was holding the camera during the eye-slashing bit. Their hands must have been shaking.
• It's short, which is its greatest mercy.

You can tell the crew was tired. You can see it in the way the subjects move—they seem bored, maybe a bit annoyed, or just performing for the sake of getting it over with. It's a million miles away from the manufactured drama of Chicago After Midnight.

It’s not a masterpiece. It’s not even really a 'movie' by modern standards. It’s just a window into a time when we were obsessed with 'the other,' and it’s deeply, deeply uncomfortable to look through. Still, I’m glad I saw it. Just don't expect to feel good afterward. 📽️