Out of Africa Visions of Africa

The film is called Out of Africa, so yeah: we're gonna get a whole lot of that part of the world right up on our screen. Sydney Pollack takes care not only to show us the landscape, animals, and things that can actually come out from the grasslands and eat you. We also learn about the culture of its people and the ways that culture bumps hard against the white colonials of the time.

Kenya looks gorgeous, too. So much pretty that you could probably watch this film just for all the landscape shots. The sweeping, widescreen visuals of the endless hills and savannahs seem to say that the problems of three little people don't amount to a hill of coffee beans https://www.shmoop.com/quotes/the-problems-of-three-little-people.html in this crazy world.

What came out of Africa for Karen Blixen? Beauty, danger, love, loss, confrontation with class and racial divides—all life-changing material for her memoirs.

Questions About Visions of Africa

1. How do we see prejudice play out against the local populace from their white rulers?
2. How is Africa dangerous to Karen, both physically and otherwise?
3. How does the landscape of Africa reflect the emotions of the characters?
4. What does Africa offer Karen that Denmark can't?

Chew on This

The film shows Europeans as being very disconnected from the land compared to their native helpers.

What Karen got most out of the punishing life in Africa was self-confidence and independence.