ABSTRACT
Clive is idealized as a 'man of destiny', a paladin of Empire, doing battle against native tyrants who oppress their own people and hamper British expansion, and against vested interests which offend against the basic Imperial principles of disinterested and just administration. The archetypal Victorian hero of Empire, however, was Charles George 'Chinese' Gordon, Gordon of Khartoum, the true 'Christian Soldier', who came to the screen in Basil Dearden's Khartoum, filmed on location in the Sudan in 1966. Another Christian hero of Empire who caught the imagination of the Victorian public was Dr David Livingstone, missionary and explorer. Livingstone and Rhodes wear themselves out and die in the service of their countries, native and adopted. Their blood and their strength are subsumed into the living, growing body of the Empire. In the climactic sequence of the film he outwits Bismarck at the Congress of Berlin to achieve peace with honour and save England and the Empire.
