Reviews of silent film releases on home video. Copyright © 1999-2026 by Carl Bennett and the Silent Era Company. All Rights Reserved.

Mamba (1930)

This first ever synchronized sound color feature, directed by Albert S. Rogell, stars Jean Hersholt and Eleanor Boardman. with Ralph Forbes, Claude Fleming, Wilhelm von Brincken, Will Stanton, Josef Swickard, Andrés de Segurola, Edward Martindel, Noble Johnson, Hazel Jones, Ian Maclaren, Francis McDonald, Arthur Stone, Torben Meyer, Paul Panzer and Matthew ‘Stymie’ Beard (look sharply for him in an early street scene).

In 1913 Africa, amid the presence of British and German occupation forces, cruel plantation owner August Bolte (Hersholt) searches for signs of respect from white locals despite his oafish behavior and mistreatment of blacks. His narcissism brings him to purchase a beautiful German noblewoman bride (Boardman) that he assumes will be the envy of the white men of position and power. Unknown to Bolte, the only looks cast his way are those of pity for his unfortunate young wife, Helen.

The new German commander, Karl von Reiden (Forbes), is most sympathetic to Helen’s plight and focuses his kind attentions on her. Their forbidden love quickly blossoms in the midst of her parched and fruitless marriage. Almost immediately, World War I begins and the German and British forces are instant enemies. A German citizen, Bolte is drafted into military service but is intercepted in an failed attempt to flee with his wife. The suppressed natives take advantage of the military vacuum and rise to revolt. Bolte fearfully flees into the jungle where he is discovered by the vengeful natives.

Boardman (hair dyed blonde for the role) actually has little to do despite her generous screen time, and Forbes appears to be a Norman Kerry/Roy D’Arcy stand-in with his little moustache and von Stroheim monocle. However, it is Jean Hersholt who stands out in this workman cast. His flawless portrayal of the cruel and cowardly Bolte is delicious viewing.

The excess of pinks and teals in the costumes and the settings was necessary to make the most of the limitations of early two-strip Technicolor, which could not accurately render colors with a yellowish component such as oranges, yellows and rich greens. In the mid-1930s, Technicolor finally developed a three-strip process that successfully rendered the full-range of rich color that we all love about Technicolor.

— Carl Bennett

The film is presented with its original synchronized sound-on-disc soundtrack digitally cleaned and restored from original Tiffany-Tone grammophone sound discs by Audio Mechanics, DJ Audio, and Simon Daniel Sound. While crackles and pops have been removed, a certain amount of hiss has been allowed to remain that is consistent with the soundtracks of other sound films from 1930.

Supplemental material includes audio commentary by Brian Trenchard-Smith; interview segments with preservationists Paul Brennan and Mike Trickett on the recovery and restoration of Mamba (8 minutes); a featurette on collectors Murray and Pat Matthews who saved the sole surviving print of Mamba (8 minutes); and an image gallery with informational texts and images from the 2018 commemorative calendar for Mamba produced by Brennan’s PTBScreen company (31 images). The typefont size of some of the texts will be too small to read on smaller television monitors.

This is our enthusiastically recommended home video edition of the film.

This Regions ABC Blu-ray Disc edition is available directly from . . .

The film is presented with its original synchronized sound-on-disc soundtrack.

This Region 0 NTSC DVD-R edition is available directly from . . .