Christian the Lion

The backstory is that Christian was separated from his parents at an early age and put up for sale in a London department store. Christian's parents were zoo lions, the father came from the Rotterdam zoo and the mother from Jerusalem, and they lived at the Ilfracombe zoo. When they had cubs, the zoo sold them, and two cubs went to the department store.

Two men, Anthony Bourke and John Rendall, found him there and immediately fell in love with him and determined to buy him. They scraped together the money and brought the little lion home when he was only a few weeks old.

Tony and John dedicated themselves to giving Christian the best life they could, and the bond that developed between them is a joy to behold. Christian was a remarkable lion, obviously very intelligent and loving, and gentle to everyone, both human and animal.

As he grew, Christian began to need bigger facilities than Tony and John could provide. Thanks to a chance meeting with Bill Travers (who had starred in the movie Born Free), they hit upon the idea of sending Christian to Africa to live as a wild lion.

Bill Travers contacted George Adamson to set up the project, and came up with the idea of making a documentary movie of it all, this movie, to fund the project. The movie starts with a re-creation of when Travers was introduced to Christian. Everything from then on was filmed as it happened.

Christian is an absolute joy to watch in this movie. The love he shows, his intelligence, his joie de vie, are beautiful.

As the movie unfolds, you begin to realize that as much as George Adamson was a bridge between the worlds of humans and animals, so was Christian.

The first step when Christian arrived at George's compound, was to introduce him to Boy, a lion who had been in the movie Born Free and who George had already sent "back" to the wild, without losing his close relationship with him. Christian and Boy eventually became best friends, and within a year Christian was living as a wild lion.

When a year had passed, Tony and John came to Africa to see Christian. After a year of struggle, tragedies, and life with a pride of lions in the wild, the relationship Christian felt with Tony and John was as strong as it had always been. In fact, Christian's wonderful relationship with Tony and John caused the other lions in the pride to accept and be at peace with them as well.

This is a movie that needs a proper DVD release. That seems unlikely, so this VHS tape, taken from a 16mm print of the film, may be your one and only chance to see this beautiful, moving story.

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