Lost In The Desert aka Dirkie (1969) one for Trevor

[Archivist]

There are films you see as a child that live with you as memories.  You don't know their names, but they hang in your memory like paintings in a museum, or return at unexpected times like an attack of chlamydia.  And like chlamydia, some of these films are not particularly pleasant.  Lost In The Desert is one such film.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_in_the_Desert



Released in 1969 in South Africa, Lost in the Desert, aka Dirkie, is about a boy named Dirkie who is (you guessed it) lost in the desert.  But the fun stops there.  Dirkie is aboard a plane with his uncle who suddenly has a heart attack, and crashes the plane in the Kalahari Desert.  Dirkie is left alone with his adorable dog, and the movie details his struggle to survive.

Trailer:
https://vimeo.com/30161111

The movie came to my mind this morning as I awoke.  I didn't know it's name, but I did remember some things.  Like how Dirkie's eyes were damaged, and how they were bandaged by the Kalahari bushmen who found him.  How they gave him cooked meat which he thought was his dog.  How wild hyenas chased down his dog.  Poor doggo.  After a quick Google for 'movie about boy lost in the desert' I finally found the movie whose scenes had sporadically haunted my memories.



I saw this movie on weekend daytime TV in Australia in what must have been the late 70's.  As a young kid, the thought of being in such a situation scared the Dirkie out of me.  And so the memories were born.

The director of Lost In The Desert, who was also the writer, actor, and actual father of the boy in the film, went on to direct The Gods Must Be Crazy (1981), another movie that features the bushmen of the Kalahari.  But no lost boys and no adorable dogs, this time.  It's a fabulously funny film, probably to make up for the horror that is Lost.

Shout out to Trevor: did you ever met James Uys?  Do you have any stories about him or his son?

[Trevor]

I work with the company which made this film almost on a daily basis.

www.mimosafilms.co.za

My first job as an archivist was to help colleagues move all of this company's films - about 5 000 cans - to the Film Archives when the company moved from Randburg to Bloemfontein.

One of Jamie Uys' colleagues, a black South African asked me if I knew about Dirkie: I said that I did. He said that he spent a year  in the desert with Jamie Uys and said that when he went to the desert, he was as white as me and when he returned from the desert he was as black as my colleague Freddie.  Freddie wanted to hit him and should have.

I never met Mr Uys, but I know the producer of the film well and most of the people that worked on this film: Uys seemed to take a perverse delight in putting his actors in harms way.

Jamie Uys also made documentaries such as the very controversial Doodkry Is Min [They Can't Oppress Us] which remains under embargo here, 57 years after being released.

[Trevor]

I should add that I saw Dirkie / Lost In the Desert in 1980 years after it was made and it left a lasting impression on me: I believe that Jamie Uys made it for his younger fans but he ended up scaring the crap out of them, including me. 

I'm not saying its' a bad film, just that I find it unsettling.

[Archivist]

Trevor, thank you for sharing these stories and experiences.  I found the movie very unsettling as well, which seems to have been a common reaction!

I wonder why the heck James Uys spent a year in the desert??  Maybe another plot to torture his people, hahaha. 

If you happen to be talking to anyone who worked on the film, perhaps ask them if they have any reminscences about it.  It says a lot about a fairly obscure South African 'kids' movie that people are talking about it more than 40 years after it was made.

It was around the same time period that I saw the Disney movie The Last Flight of Noah's Ark (1980), which was another adventure/survival movie, but with a very different feel and impact.

Thank you again! 

[Trevor]

Trevor, thank you for sharing these stories and experiences.  I found the movie very unsettling as well, which seems to have been a common reaction!

I wonder why the heck James Uys spent a year in the desert??  Maybe another plot to torture his people, hahaha. 

If you happen to be talking to anyone who worked on the film, perhaps ask them if they have any reminscences about it.  It says a lot about a fairly obscure South African 'kids' movie that people are talking about it more than 40 years after it was made.

It was around the same time period that I saw the Disney movie The Last Flight of Noah's Ark (1980), which was another adventure/survival movie, but with a very different feel and impact.

Thank you again! 

No problem.

Jamie was a notorious perfectionist: he spent much time filming both Dirkie and the later Beautiful People in the desert: he even suffered a heart attack during the making of the latter film but it was finished and even won a Golden Globe.

His best film was the 1962 comedy Lord Oom Piet [Lord Uncle Pete] where the title character - a farmer - finds out that he is an Englishman, he is a Lord, he has property in England and also he is Queen Elizabeth 11's nephew 

[Archivist]

To be honest, I was quite surprised when I found out a couple of days ago that Dirkie was a South African film.  As a very young child, I just assumed all English-speaking films were from America, Britain or maybe Canada!

Then I immediately though, "waaaaiiit... classic South African film ... Trevor might know these people!" 

[Trevor]

To be honest, I was quite surprised when I found out a couple of days ago that Dirkie was a South African film.  As a very young child, I just assumed all English-speaking films were from America, Britain or maybe Canada!

Then I immediately though, "waaaaiiit... classic South African film ... Trevor might know these people!"  

In one of the overseas release versions, Jamie Uys renamed himself "Hayes" and his son Wynand as "Dirkie Hayes": that caused a little storm in a toilet bowl here at home.  



Incidentally, Jamie Uys was born Johannes Jacobus [John Jacob] Uys until a Scottish neighbour renamed him "Jamie" as he had too many Js in his name.  

[Scaredtodeath]

I am so reassured to see this thread. I too saw this as a child. It was shown as the supporting film to the main feature, which I think might have been one of the 'Herbie' car films, but I can't remember anything about the actual film I'd gone to see as I was so distressed by Lost in the Desert. It includes every nightmare situation that can a child could imagine, including returning to the sight of the plane crash and seeing the bones of his uncle having been picked clean by vultures, and, as was mentioned above, the horror of seeing his beloved dog injured by a hyena and later, thinking he had inadvertently eaten him. I watched some of it again recently to see if it was as bad as I remembered and it really is. There isn't even enough resolution at the end to balance out the misery. When he's finally found, there are several minutes of leading the viewer to think both father and son are now lost in the desert - and the father almost shoots the dog. No one in their right mind nowadays would expose young children to this much stress in the name of entertainment. It was truly the most awful thing I watched as a child.

[Trevor]

I am so reassured to see this thread. I too saw this as a child. It was shown as the supporting film to the main feature, which I think might have been one of the 'Herbie' car films, but I can't remember anything about the actual film I'd gone to see as I was so distressed by Lost in the Desert. It includes every nightmare situation that can a child could imagine, including returning to the sight of the plane crash and seeing the bones of his uncle having been picked clean by vultures, and, as was mentioned above, the horror of seeing his beloved dog injured by a hyena and later, thinking he had inadvertently eaten him. I watched some of it again recently to see if it was as bad as I remembered and it really is. There isn't even enough resolution at the end to balance out the misery. When he's finally found, there are several minutes of leading the viewer to think both father and son are now lost in the desert - and the father almost shoots the dog. No one in their right mind nowadays would expose young children to this much stress in the name of entertainment. It was truly the most awful thing I watched as a child.

I worked in the SA film industry for over three decades until my retirement last year and worked closely with the now defunct company which made this film. While Jamie Uys made some wonderful comedies and some great serious films, he seemed to take a peculiar delight in putting his family in harms way: in one of his early movies, he cast his wife as a person who gets killed by a venomous snake and this film where his son Wynand is cast - was and remains complete nightmare fuel for many.

There are two versions of this: one in Afrikaans for local release and one in English for the international market.

Afrikaans version:  www.youtube.com/watch?v=AIgbqiamqKQ&list=PLr6n6KbbYtjWhv7Y2booN_FLhK0bvBUr3&index=8

English version: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sz0f06y5Xew&list=PLr6n6KbbYtjWhv7Y2booN_FLhK0bvBUr3&index=9

The Afrikaans version is about 3 minutes longer than the English one.

Along with Uys' political drama Doodkry Is Min [They Can't Oppress Us, 1961], this is one of the most uncomfortable films I have ever sat through.

[Archivist]

I worked in the SA film industry for over three decades until my retirement last year and worked closely with the now defunct company which made this film. While Jamie Uys made some wonderful comedies and some great serious films, he seemed to take a peculiar delight in putting his family in harms way: in one of his early movies, he cast his wife as a person who gets killed by a venomous snake and this film where his son Wynand is cast - was and remains complete nightmare fuel for many.

Trevor! Congratulations on your retirement! May it bring you the rest and refreshment that you deserve. I wish you would write more about your time in the SA film industry, perhaps a series of posts in a thread (hint hint).

[Trevor]

I worked in the SA film industry for over three decades until my retirement last year and worked closely with the now defunct company which made this film. While Jamie Uys made some wonderful comedies and some great serious films, he seemed to take a peculiar delight in putting his family in harms way: in one of his early movies, he cast his wife as a person who gets killed by a venomous snake and this film where his son Wynand is cast - was and remains complete nightmare fuel for many.

Trevor! Congratulations on your retirement! May it bring you the rest and refreshment that you deserve. I wish you would write more about your time in the SA film industry, perhaps a series of posts in a thread (hint hint).

Thanks 😊😊

My book has a lot of the stories about my involvement in our film industry so stay tuned 😊🐢