Josef von Sternberg's "The Shanghai Gesture"

January 18, 2011 2:20 PM

The other places are like kindergartens compared with this. It smells so incredibly evil! I didn't think such a place existed except in my own imagination. It has a ghastly familiarity like a half-remembered dream. *Anything* could happen here... any moment... Pauline Kael called it "hilariously, awesomely terrible". Others consider it "a forgotten gem of a film that set the gold standard for noir films to come". It was Josef von Sternberg's last major film - The Shanghai Gesture (1941). (parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)
posted by Joe Beese (7 comments total)

I watched it recently. I don't know about all the praise, von Sternberg never impressed me as a director, but Victor Mature was excellent here, his best work next to After the Fox... worth seeing for that alone.
posted by VikingSword at 2:37 PM on January 18, 2011

There's a weird note on the Turner Classic Movies page for this film, which says "[von Sternberg] was so physically disabled, he did most of his work while lying on a cot." He lived until December 1969, some 28 years beyond the film, and in my quick jaunts about the 'net find no more mention of his illness or disability.

The TCM page also states that 30 treatments of this film were turned down by the censorship of Will Hayes. A commenter following the Noir of the Week review (prev, self-linking) said that Bette Davis wanted the role of Mother Goddamn, but was worried the censorship would change the film and she'd end up playing "Mother gosh-darn."
posted by filthy light thief at 2:41 PM on January 18, 2011 [2 favorites]

Additional trivia: Gene Tierney's stunning dresses were designed by Oleg Cassini (perhaps best known for creating Jacqueline Kennedy's state wardrobe) - whom she married the year this film was released and who became her exclusive costumer.
posted by Joe Beese at 2:50 PM on January 18, 2011

A feature-length post! Thanks, Joe. You're the Beese Kneese.
posted by Jode at 3:58 PM on January 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

filthy light thief: I googled and got a few results. Here's the original source, via Google Books:

As he wrote in his autobiography Confessions from a Chinese Laundry: "Most of the film — though this does not show — I directed from a cot, while lying on my back.

Don't know what he was afflicted with.
posted by floam at 4:29 PM on January 18, 2011 [1 favorite]

Just watched the first three. I didn't intend to but they are quite compelling! Thanks for the links. A terrific film and hypnotic actors.
posted by binturong at 6:47 PM on January 18, 2011

I love this crazy, lurid movie -- it's one of the DVDs I delight in lending out to unsuspecting friends. It's largely because of this role that Gene Tierney is my favorite old-school Hollywood femme fatale.
posted by the bricabrac man at 4:49 AM on January 19, 2011