The Shanghai Gesture Movie Review 1942

A wildly baroque, subversive melodrama. An English financier tries to close a gambling den, only to be blackmailed by the female proprietor--who tells him not only is the man's daughter heavily indebted to her, but that she is the wife he abandoned long ago. Based on a notorious Broadway play. Von Sternberg had to make numerous changes to the script in order to get it past the Hays censors; the director's final Hollywood work, and worthy of his oeuvre, but oddly unsatisfying.

Distribution

Critics' Choice Video & DVD, PO Box 749, Itasca, IL 60143, Toll-free: 800-993-6357, Email: vcatalog@ccvideo.com, URL: http://www.ccvideo.com

Available on VHS, DVD
Running time 97 minutes.

Cast and Crew

Genres

Gambling, Family Ties, Adapted from a Play

Screenplay

Josef von Sternberg, Jules Furthman, Geza Herczeg, Karl Vollmoller

Cast

Walter Huston, Gene Tierney, Victor Mature, Ona Munson, Albert Bassermann, Eric Blore, Maria Ouspenskaya, Phyllis Brooks, Mike Mazurki

Cinematography

Paul Ivano

Director

Josef von Sternberg

Music

Richard Hageman

Producer

Arnold Pressburger