East Meets West 101

Shamelessly derived from "Casablanca" - and a decent job of it. Right down to Mitchum's winning money off a crooked game in an exotic casino to fund a fast ticket out of town.

OK, it's loaded dice, not a rigged roulette wheel - it's a ticket for Mitchum, not his dame - it's a ship, not a plane - and it's Hong Kong's mid-Century gambling pit, not Morocco's. Big diff.

And there's a local lawman winking at the law, a casino-owner with a shady past - and plenty of other cinematic intellectual borrowing as well.

The plot/dialogue is a little too fluffy for true-noir (though there's some sharp/smart enough talk sprinkled about), still it's an entertaining 85 minutes - and a bit of a surprise that classic-noir fans have left this film this fairly unnoticed.

Robert Mitchum and Jane Russell ain't no Bogey and Bacall, but framed by this seedy Occidental den-of-sin filled with players playing both sides of the law, the duo is entertaining enough to watch. Mitchum always made for a good noir-gumshoe and there's just (barely) enough snooping here for him to hang his Fedora on.

Here, Russell was still well under Howard Hughes' thumb/eye, so the camera's obsessively driven to showcase her figure/endowment from every angle. As the smoky saloon songster, she belts out a couple o' forgettable numbers. Delivery-wise, Russell's interesting; at the mere turn of a word, she flips back-and-forth from hard-bit and hard-hearted to the little girl still dreaming of her Prince Charming, thereby proving a degree of acting ability. The rest of the cast plays fairly flat.

Save some establishing shots, this is all set-piece work, and it shows.

RECOMMENDATION: Not top-tier classic-noir, but still, really, fans of such should spin it up.

In the same way that mid-Century San Francisco is so lushly admired by "Vertigo," this film preserves and adores mid-Century Hong Kong.

Though the actors deliver their story competently, the film's best recommendation toward today's viewer is the extensive high-quality cinematography of 1955 Hong Kong, its streets filled with small exotic shops, Repulse Bay unshadowed by skyscrapers, the city's waterways afloat with authentic junks, kaitos and sampans. Cinemascope; color by DeLuxe.

Every non-dialogue shot is on location; dialogue shots/scenes are set pieces, employing location back-plates as required. The "tree on the hill" scenes, for example, shot in Southern California, not Hong Kong.

"Splendored" is a dramatization of the 1949 star-crossed, forbidden love between a Western reporter (Holden) and a Chinese/Flemish doctor (Jones). Much of the dialogue and storyline is adapted directly from the source autobiographical novel by Han Suyin.

The film's a Fox vehicle, among many out of the industry during the 1950s, intended to soften existing racial prejudices (eg, "South Pacific," "The Searchers," "The Defiant Ones," "The World of Suzie Wong"). It is ironic, then, that Fox refused to cast the female lead ethnically and instead inserted a proven Caucasian box-office draw, on screen without any accent and a face barely made Chinese at all.

The tag-team commentary by a historian and veteran film technicians is above-average but not outstanding.

RECOMMENDATION: See it. Gorgeous viewing that captures well a time, culture and beautiful locale long gone by.

A second-tier mid-Century musical that nevertheless is still well respected, as it contains a goodly number of great Rodgers & Hammerstein numbers that will be re-remembered fondly by many viewers.

Two love affairs blossom on a quiet island, sheltered from most of the conflict of World War II. One affair is between a Navy Nurse and a French plantation owner with native children; the other between a young Marine and a far younger native girl.

Accordingly, each affair is inappropriately interrupted by the racial stigmas of the day. Such a topic was surely considered a touchy one in its day. Loosely based on the award-winning James Michener memoir 'Tales of the South Pacific.'

Even aficionados of mid-Century musicals may well have forgotten the many high quality R&H numbers that fell from this production, including 'Bali Ha'i,' 'Some Enchanted Evening,' 'I'm Gonna Wash That Man Right Outa My Hair,' 'This Nearly Was Mine,' and 'Younger Than Springtime.' Such numbers readily qualify the film for a revisiting.

Director Logan controversially imposed heavily colored lens filters whenever there was presence of strong human emotion. Today's consensus is that the filters highly detract from the viewing experience. Logan eventually disowned the technique as a lapse in judgment. A proper restoration might bring the filtering down to a level that does not require such begrudging tolerance of the viewer.

RECOMMENDATION: This film will likely never be rated as well crafted as, say, 'The King and I', but it surely rates inclusion in the catalogs of viewers who are fans of the genre.

Ingrid Bergman wasted on a soapy-sappy idealized & hacked-up telling of the life of Gladys Aylward, British maid turned Christian missionary in northern China during the 1930s/1940s.

Technicolor and CinemaScope spent not on Chinese locales but Wales countryside and London set pieces; Communist China might have been closed to the West at the time, but no use of Taiwan or Hong Kong suggests budget-scrimping. Aylward disapproved of the scriptwork, calling it "a pack of lies." In accordance with standard operating procedure of the day, the major Chinese roles are cast with Caucasians. Even the name of Aylward's abode is incorrect; it was actually called "The Inn of the Eight Happinesses." Why MGM scriptwriters changed that, traded down to 25% less happiness, well who can say.

The only redeeming value of the film is that it will inform the viewer of the now obsolete practice of Chinese foot-binding. I knew nothing of this cruel and senseless custom, and was shocked to learn of it. How anyone could have thought this practice added beauty to the feminine form is entirely beyond me.

RECOMMENDATION: Take a pass. Instead, devote your viewing time to some other far more worthy film within the Ingrid Bergman catalog ... and use Wiki to self-inform regarding the cruelty of foot-binding.

In certain ways even better than the similarly-themed "Love Is A Many Splendored Thing" (also starring Holden), which five-years-earlier delivered 20thCentury Fox a box-office smash that Paramount is here trying to replicate via a 'looking-glass' strategy.

As opposed to Splendored's well-educated, well-bred, reserved Chinese medical doctor as Holden's love interest, Suzie Wong's a entirely different type of 'professional' - clever, proud, good-natured, trying to save face while bootstrapping herself out of poverty one client at a time.

And while Fox played it straight-down-the-line installing a proven 30ish Caucasian female actress as lead (barely made Chinese on-screen), Paramount had the courage/insight to field a then-unknown 20-year-old Asian (Nancy Kwan) who delivered an endearing and career-best performance right out-of-the-gate.

And here Holden's a starving artist, not a successful journalist.

Spendored leans heavy on outstandingly lush mid-Century Hong Kong cinematography to engage viewers, while going lighter on character development. In this film, on the other hand, Holden and Kwan deliver much deeper. Viewers quickly develop strong empathy/interest in both characters; the sets shine mostly because these two stand within them.

Though there's good gandering at Hong Kong via establishing/external shots, Wong's moreso built around set pieces from MGM's London lot.

Further, Wong's a more light-hearted dramatic romance - both Holden and the audience enjoy being the disengaged viewers of the shenanigans inside the brothel where Holden's rooming - whereas Splendored's drama is far more undiluted and heavy-handed.

Widescreen; Technicolor. From a 1957 novel by British writer Richard Mason, inspired by his own residency within the once-infamous Wan Chai district of Hong Kong.

RECOMMENDATION: Suzie Wong's the absolutely perfect double-bill/bookend to Splendored; though the two films differ in certain respects, viewers enjoying one will undoubtedly enjoy the other. See 'em both.

Two films mixed up here. Mr. Baseball with Tom Selleck is a light rom-com about an American ball player who gets set to the Japanese leagues, where he learns how different the culture ... and the culture of the game ... is there.

This film defines "love it or hate it." It sure ain't for Pixar/Disney/Spiderman crowd -- it's just far too sophisticated, subtle & slow.

Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson, separated by decades of age, coincidently find themselves standing in the exact same spot, at the exact same time, in the exact same life. That being the New York Bar on the 52nd Floor of the Park Hyatt Toyko, just as the realization strikes that their marriages satisfy their partners but not them, that they are unappreciated by their partners, that their marriages are no longer what they expected a marriage to be. Ever so suddenly, the decision to separate (or not) hovers above each of them like a dark, quiet storm cloud. So they start sharing space under a romantic umbrella shielding them from the rain that is sure to come.

And make no mistake about it, it IS a tale of May-December romance between (then) barely-legal Johansson and (still) senior-citizen Murray. Legions of reviewers, even the studio marketing campaigners, portrayed this as a film about friendship -- and a chaste, temporary friendship at that. If that's so, then why is Johansson playing the stewing two-timed lover at the sushi restaurant in Act III? And what about the night before he's to leave ... where she's imploring him to not leave, that they can both dump their spouses and stay together in Toyko. As what, BFFs? And on that very last night, just how did Murray's jacket get off his kimono ... and into Johansson's hotel room? Say you didn't SEE any sex when they were sharing a bed in Act II? Just her toe gently touching his leg, then his hand gently touching her foot, then fade to black? Well folks, that's an invitation-to-the-dance Harlequin-style ... and that's just the type of cinema that explicitly implied sex back in the days of film when MURRAY was barely-legal, implied since censors had to be delicately skirted. Even in the DVD extras, Murray subtly refers to that scene as one of 'consummation.' Those who take this as some kind of daddy-daughter road trip flick, well those viewers obviously lost something in their own translation of this film. And the director's left much translating for the viewer to do over the film's many informational gaps, made obvious when the viewer realizes he/she is never shown the two actually telling each other their names or phone numbers.

And that metaphor-- lost in translation-- permeates the film. The entire film dwells upon gaps in communication. First at the literal level, where what Murray's being told by his Japanese translators comes up way short of the intended messages -- during a whiskey commercial shoo or a guest appearance on a TV show. More importantly, of course, it permeates at a symbolic level. What Murray and Johansson are saying to their spouses, well, that's not what the spouses are hearing. Murray's spouse: "Do I have to start worrying about you?" Murray: "Only if you want to." Then there's the noise in the communication between Murray and Johansson. She, so much wiser than her age, makes her decision quick and starts telegraphing messages to Murray almost right-out-of-the-gate. But it's not until the very last scene, when he's sure he'll never see her again, that Murray fully translates and absorbs what Johansson's been saying oh-so very clearly all the way down the line.

Japan co-stars in a major supporting role. This film admires and captures the country in the same way that "Vertigo" admires MidCentury San Francisco and "Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing" admires MidCentury Hong Kong. Director Sofia Coppola lovingly lingers her camera on the midnight neon and pulsing pachinko parlors and video game rooms of Toyko ... then travels to a Kyoto shrine to quietly observe Johansson stroll across a koi pond and to tie her omikuji wishes upon a tree (wishes, take note, that fall from the morning after her toe-touching night with Murray). Coppola is here not only admiring the beauty of both old Japan and new, but showing viewers how something important was lost in time's translation from one to the other.

Sofia Coppola has visited, and been enthralled with, Japan since childhood. This film's visual endearment of Japan is HER endearment, how she lovingly sees it. The same can be said about Murray as lead. Coppola supposedly wrote this screenplay Murray-in-mind and called him hundreds of times to beg him to play it. Hence Johansson's endearment of Murray in film ... is likely a very true telling of Coppola's endearment of Murray in life. No wonder this film tugs the strings of viewers so well; it's Coppola's life-long meditation, her lyrical tone-poem, about her perfect man ... perfectly opening to her romance ... in her perfect location.

And viewers are ever so fortunate that she was willing to bare her soul ... and film it.

RECOMMENDATION: Quite unlike Spidey-Man XII in 4-D, this film is sure to become one of the Century's classics. Get there.