Audiences do not get enough explorer stories in my book, that’s why the idea of The Lost City of Z is so exciting.
Charlie Hunnam stars as the real life Percy Fawcett, the early twentieth century British military man who felt his career was heading down a dead end and was hoping that something would fall out of the sky and help him with some upward mobility. His family name was shot (his father was a drunk and soiled his moniker). His military medal-gathering time was winding down. Opportunity was scarce. Then, he was ordered to report to the British National Geographical Society and fate struck like a bolt of lightning.
The government wants him to head up an explorer group (along with Robert Pattinson’s Henry Costin) to the Amazon to map and delve deeper into the Brazil/Peru border area. They would experience new cultures, potential riches for the Empire and of course, danger around every corner. Of course, there is a cost. The journey will mean being gone for years at a stretch, something that will keep Fawcett away from his young children and wife, Nina (Sienna Miller). But, such is the price to pay for professional, social and dare we say… scientific advancement.
While on this first journey into the unknown, the group succeeds on many fronts. They go deeper into the jungle than any expedition in history and discover peoples, creatures and sociological finds previously undiscovered. Yet, there is something pulling at Fawcett and Costin. It is a city of legend that many of the locals murmur about, but no one has any actual proof it exists. Fawcett calls it The Lost City of Z and if he is correct, it is a civilization that is decades beyond the primitive cultures of the area. It is ripe with the highest of technology of the day, gold, architecture and medical advancement only dreamed of prior. The thing is, this is a revolutionary thought and in many circles in Europe, it is just plain blasphemy. See, anyone not from Europe, and specifically native peoples from other continents like the Africa, Americas, both North and South, are thought of as savages. If Fawcett’s theories are true, it threatens everything Europe’s ruling class has put forth.
Americans, on the other hand, well… there are a different breed. They are not threatened by such things and are actually more fascinated with pushing boundaries and going where no man has gone before. Fawcett may be able to go find his City of Z, bring his adult son along and make history.
The strength of The Lost City of Z lies on several fronts. The first is its scope. It spans decades and as such writer-director James Gray has a massive canvas to fill over its 150-plus minute span. The second strength feeds into the first and carries it on his handsome shoulders… star Hunnam. The man is in practically every scene and finally gets a vehicle to prove he is the superstar movie legend he has only previously hinted it.
Gray, whose previous films have been much more intimate, rises to the challenge of a true-story period piece/jungle explorer historical epic. The audience feels the wild of the wilderness and how out of place these Europeans are with native peoples, yet how they are the perfect peoples at the perfect time to make this innately human connection that would bridge cultures (albeit temporarily) and take us as a human race further on the social evolutionary scale. The helmer also impeccably captures the English landscape, both in its production design-based feel and its social morays that find anything they don’t understand deemed savage and therefore worthy of disdain.
Hunnam finally has his film that shows audiences, casting directors and anyone else who has the pleasure of witnessing The Lost City of Z that he is a talent worthy of headlining pictures of simultaneous vastness and intimacy. His scenes with Miller are heartwarming and heartbreaking. His moments with his son Jack (Tom Holland, who we will soon see in Spiderman: Homecoming) run the emotional spectrum. Overall, the British actor shows us that he is ready to take his career to the next level and that as a co-producer on this project, Hunnam also spotlights that he has a keen eye for stories that need to be brought to light.
Grade: B+