In fact, the entire events depicted in the 1969 version only take up about 5 minutes of the feature film, and even those events are handled in a very different (and I personally feel much more satisfying) way than the earlier film. A lot of time is spent in the growing up process for these characters, especially Tama. Tama finally is able to leave the island, promising to return for Mahana and take care of her as soon as he can. Mahana is also an outcast, rejected even by her own father, and the children form a bond. However, after a series of misfortunes occur on the island, Tama is blamed and becomes an outcast, living in the house of the poorest family on the island, that of Mahana and her father. At first the islanders welcome the child into their midst, giving him the name of Tama. Without giving too much of the plot away, the film begins when a baby boy is washed up onto Malio Island during a fierce storm. Once they realized it was a feature-length film based on the same story, the next logical question was how in the world could anyone stretch that story over nearly two hours and keep it interesting? In fact, The Legend of Johnny Lingo (which is the title of the feature) actually deals with much more of the lives of Johnny Lingo and Mahana than the other film. Several in attendance mentioned how they had wondered why they should get up on a Saturday morning and go downtown to see a 20-minute film produced in 1969. It may be that long ago there really was a Johnny Lingo."įor some of those invited to the special screening, there was - at first - a little confusion. "People I've talked to have told me they knew the story before it was ever published. At a private screening of the film in Salt Lake City, Garbett answered a few questions and spoke about the origin of the story, which he says may truly be very old - on the order of a legend. LDS producers John Garbett and Jerry Molen (winner of an Academy Award as the producer of Schindler's List) have decided to follow up The Other Side of Heaven, the highest grossing LDS Cinema film to date, by producing a feature-length version of the Johnny Lingo story. And its origins may go further back than that. The story was first published in the mid-1960s and has been translated into dozens of languages and reprinted in hundreds of publications, having been read and enjoyed by millions of people throughout the world. The film was actually adapted from a short story by writer Patricia McGerr, who - aside from Johnny Lingo - was best known for her mystery novels and short stories. Since members can hardly get through seminary without having seen the film at least once, they might be surprised to learn that this story's origin has nothing to do with the church. Who knows how many countless Aaronic Priesthood or Young Women's lessons have involved showing this film over the years? Who can forget such classic lines as "Mahana, you ugly!" or seeing Mahana's father stomping away from the young couple's home insisting that he'd been cheated, even though Johnny Lingo paid him nearly twice as large a dowry as any man had paid for a wife before? The film is memorable for its silliness, for its politically incorrect setting, and for its timeless message about some of the consequences (good or bad) of the ways we treat those around us. Whitaker went on to produce and/or direct such notable church classics as The Windows of Heaven, Cipher in the Snow, The Lost Manuscript and of course, Johnny Lingo. Wilkinson in 1952 to establish a film studio from scratch (now known as the LDS Motion Picture Studio), worked for 16 years as an animator at the Walt Disney Studios on such notable features as Peter Pan, Alice in Wonderland and Cinderella. Whitaker, who before being approached by BYU president Ernest L. Blaisdell, who also made a guest appearance on one of the original Star Trek episodes, and Francis Urry, who also played President Lorenzo Snow in another classic church film, The Windows of Heaven, and whose voice is heard narrating the children's audio tapes and videos of scripture stories produced by the church. The version of the story most members are familiar with is the BYU-produced short film made in 1969 starring Makee K. The story of Johnny Lingo and his eight-cow wife has become so much a part of LDS culture you might be tempted to believe that Johnny Lingo was an early Polynesian member of the church. The Legend of Johnny Lingo (2003) - Back to "The Legend of Johnny Lingo" page 4
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