Hopus 45

Call Me Bwana. "No harm intended," says the native chief who has buried Bob Hope right up to his ears in Africa. "Just part of our culture." The same may be said of Bob Hope's 45th movie, but the statement does not make the experience of it any less regrettable.

Hope is a bogus bwana who writes reams about his African adventures but has actually never been anywhere wilder than the Museum of Natural History. Drafted by the CIA, he is sent to the Congo to recover a moon capsule that went slightly off course. The Russians send Anita Ekberg, a bumptious intelligence agent, to waylay him. "If you are captured," Hope is instructed, "take a cyanide capsule. Death is instantaneous and clean." Hope gulps: "You mean, no side effects?"

He decides he would rather take Anita, who poses as the daughter of a missionary. "I feel," she murmurs seductively as they bounce through the bush, "as though layers of civilization were being peeled off me." Hope rolls his eyes. "Wonderful girl," he mutters. "All heart." But Edie Adams, a CIA cutie who has come along for the ride, has other ideas. "There's something about her," she says flatly, "that's false."

And so on. Occasionally there is a nice wacky line (Missionary: "Do you like Bach?" Hope: "I'll drink anything"), but for the most part the picture is sheer bwanality.

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