This film a clef presents Peter Viertel, who had a hand in writing "The African Queen," as what appears to be the principal author of the screenplay. Since he was present during the shooting of "The African Queen" (1951) and since he wrote this fictionalized account of the making of the movie, he's intelligent, sensitive, handsome, talented, and humane. He's played by Jeff Fahey, who is at least handsome, whatever else he is.

The real director was John Huston who wound up making one of the best-crafted films of his career in Africa. He's played by the director of the current movie, Clint Eastwood. Eastwood is hired to shoot the film but his real interest -- his passion -- isn't making the movie but rather shooting a bull elephant. He keeps putting off the movie in pursuit of the game. The shooting of "The African Queen" doesn't even begin until the very end, and the last word is "action." I hope I didn't get that too mixed up. The plot is easy enough to follow but describing it is a bit of a challenge. It's not about shooting "The African Queen." It's about preparing to shoot "The Afican Queen." The Katherine Hepburn character (Marissa Berenson) appears only briefly and has a few lines. Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall are barely noticeable.

Eastwood, who also directed, does a recognizable impersonation of John Huston's distinctive intonations. That's the easy part. I can do it myself. The script initially gives us a cheerful, charming, and witty Huston, all smiles and cigarillos. Drunkenly, nobly, he gets into a fist fight with a bigger and younger man and is pounded to the ground. His friends help him to his feet and one of them says, "We'd better get a doctor." "He's hurt that bad, huh?", Eastwood gasps.

But once we get to Africa the story turns a bit and so does Eastwood. He loses whatever sense of responsibility he had to the producers and crew and concentrates on finding that damned big tusker he wants as a trophy. I could never understand why anyone would want to shoot and kill a mammoth like that. They're a danger to no one. They eat grass and leaves and mind their own business. This is being written three weeks after poachers in a national park in Zimbabwe poisoned an elephant watering hole and killed about 300 of the beasts.

At any rate, this film reminded me of a short from an entirely different genre. Laurel and Hardy are preparing a boat they intend to launch. They saw away at it, step the mast, paint the hull. All kinds of pratfalls and mistakes take place. The boat sinks the moment it touches water. The whole comedy was a set up for a much larger adventure that never comes off.

Instead of a story about the actual making of "The African Queen," which was quite an adventure in itself, we have a character study of a John-Huston-like figure. And it fails to really come off, even as a character study. In the penultimate scene, Eastwood confronts a huge elephant who presents him with a perfect shot only a few feet away. Eastwood doesn't shoot. Okay. I understand that much. Faced with such magnificence, Eastwood experiences finally a kind of external reality. There are values that transcend his own.

But then his "native bearer" and admired friend, Kivu, sacrifices his own life to save Eastwood's. I don't believe it. And when Eastwood and company return to begin shooting the picture, just after the death, Eastwood looks glum, but I have no idea what he's thinking beyond the obvious remorse.

It's colorful and Huston was a Byronic figure, but this ought to be more fun than it is.