The Macomber Affair (1947)

A hunting guide (Gregory Peck) takes rich adventurers on safari in Kenya. When he takes an unhappily married couple (Joan Bennett, Robert Preston) into the wilds, it's quite possible they may be more dangerous than the wild animals they hunt. Based on the Ernest Hemingway short story THE SHORT HAPPY LIFE OF FRANCIS MACOMBER, this is one of the few Hemingway adaptations that do him justice. I suppose it helps that it's based on a short story rather than a novel but the screenplay by Casey Robinson (NOW VOYAGER) and Seymour Bennett is a compact and lean vision that approximates the lean writing style of Hemingway. Though Peck is top billed and he's just fine, it's Bennett and Preston as the battling couple (right out of an Albee play) who grab our attention. It's certainly Preston's finest pre-MUSIC MAN hour on film, his Francis Macomber is both poignant and repulsive and Preston keeps you properly ambivalent toward his character. Neatly directed by Zoltan Korda (1942's THE JUNGLE BOOK) with a potent Miklos Rozsa score. With Reginald Denny and Jean Gillie, so memorable in DECOY.