#Beyond the last horizon movie movie#

Ever-clever, Hollywood filmed two endings and when the one of Conway successfully returning was deemed too happy, cut the more ambiguous one of Conway still struggling. Interestingly enough, however, Hilton leaves us with the paradox of our hero Conway, having escaped from the escapist dream, struggling to return to the lost horizon of Shangri-La. From the current perspective of an age of nuclear proliferation and continuing ethnic and political strife worldwide, perhaps their fears were well-founded. In the aftermath of the War to End All Wars, Hilton and Hollywood feared that man might not be so fortunate. In Shangri-La, an individual lived long enough to outlive his greed and lust and destructive tendencies. Here was still, to quote Joseph Campbell, “an isolated society, dream-bounded within a mythically-charged horizon.” In Shangri-La, there was no fearful “ism,” no modern nation-state, no economic-political organization of empire or kingdom, but that best of all governments: the benevolent dictatorship, infused with moderation, virtue and sweet serenity (and, incidentally, Western classical music and plumbing). In Tibet, among the mountains of the Himalaya whose scale and grandeur exceeded even Western superlatives, here the American hoped the best of man lay protected. Tibet, among the last lands unveiled to the West, became, in Shangri-La, the projected dream home of millions. The escapist dream of Lost Horizon filled a barely subconscious need. Still war-weary, they were among those whose perspective led them to fear that the world again was being pulled into war. On contemplating the reason for the flight, Conway muses whether it’s “the will of God or the lunacy of man - it seemed to him you could take your choice…Or alternatively, the will of man and the lunacy of God…” Then Conway is transported to the lamasery at Shangri-La where the High Lama has built a sanctuary for civilization, preserving “the frail elegances of a dying age and seeking such wisdom as men will need when their passions are spent.”Ĭonway was a veteran of World War I, as were, figuratively, Hilton and Hollywood in the 1930s. Hilton’s hero, Conway, is kidnapped on a flight from revolution-torn Baskul across bleak mountains to beyond the edges of the Frontier. What would make James Hilton’s “brooding masterpiece” such a sensation in the Western world in the 1930s? What was it about the land of Tibet cum Shangri-La that has continued to so capture the imagination of the West? Heralded by three years of record-breaking book sales, Lost Horizon was an instant and enduring success at the box office as well.

#Beyond the last horizon movie movie#

Such were the plaudits of the critics at the movie opening of the U$2 million extravaganza of Lost Horizon in New York in 1937. Spectacle, excitement, romance… Stirring, fantastic… Thrilling and compassionate… A grand adventure…A drama of heart’s desire come true.”