NEW ULM– The New Ulm Film Society’s Director series focusing on films directed by Clint Eastwood continues Tuesday with a screening of “White Hunter, Black Heart.”

The screening begins at 6:30 p.m. in the New Ulm Public Library basement and is free to the public.

“White Hunter, Black Heart” was released in 1990. It was the 15th film directed by Eastwood and is one of his most introspective films.

The movie is based on a 1953 novel written by Peter Viertel. The book and film are fictional, but it is widely believed Viertel based the book on his experiences working on the production of the 1951 film “The African Queen.”

The production of “The African Queen” was unusual for the time period. The film was set in Africa and filmed on location. Location filming was rarely done for Hollywood films because of the expense, but director John Huston insisted on filming there. It is believed the reason Huston insisted on filming in Africa is he wanted to go on safari and shoot an elephant and directing the movie was an excuse to achieve this goal.

Viertel, the film’s screenwriter, followed Huston on his expedition to hunt an elephant. His book “White Hunter, Black Heart” is a fictionalized version of these events. The names of the real-life people and some of the events were changed. For instance, the movie is centered around making a film called “The African Trader” instead of “The African Queen.”

The film director who is obsessed with hunting an elephant is not John Huston. In this story, he is called John Wilson.

“White Hunter, Black Heart” blurs the line between reality and fiction. Audiences watching the movie are forced to question what they are seeing and what is true.

Further complicating the narrative, Clint Eastwood not only directed “White Hunter, Black Heart” but also he played the lead character, director John Wilson.

This means Eastwood directed himself by playing a film director, who is a fictionalized version of the famed film director John Huston.

For this film, Eastwood adopted a different speaking pattern. As an actor, Eastwood rarely changes the way he talks for a role, but for “White Hunter, Black Heart” he chose to draw out his vowels. This was something Huston did in real-life, suggesting Eastwood was emulating the real-life director. At the same time, Eastwood maintains some of his personal mannerisms making the character of Wilson a combination of himself and Huston.

This has led several film critics to question whether this is a film about legendary director John Huston or whether it is a film about Eastwood trying to grapple with his own legacy as a director. Most critics come to believe it is a little of both.

When “White Hunter, Black Heart” was released in 1990, it was not a financial success. It was dismissed early on as one of Eastwood’s lesser films, but in the decades since, it has grown in popularity.

Critics cite this film as the start of Eastwood’s tendency to comment and critique his own career. In this film, Eastwood is intentionally playing with the audience’s perception of him as an actor and director. He would do this again a few years later with “Unforgiven,” which serves as a commentary about his legacy as a Western film star.

The success of “Unforgiven” made critics and audiences revisit “White Hunter, Black Heart” and realize the earlier film was a first attempt at self-commentary. This is something Eastwood continued to do throughout the ’90s and in some recent films.