The Shanghai Gesture (1941) User Reviews

Three Marlene .

[dbdumonteil · 8/10 · 4 October 2004]

Marlene Dietrich,even if she does not appear is present here :she's the marvelous Gene Tierney,the terrifying Ona Munson and the cynical Victor Mature."The Shanghai gesture" is one of my favorite Sternberg movies.I love the lines which warns us at the beginning of the film:it's not real Shanghai,it does not take place in the present.

"The Shanghai gesture" is an unclassifiable work: a film noir?a melodrama?Most likely an extravaganza ,an incredible exotic story which smells of the intoxicating perfume of poisonous flowers.The gigantic dive looks like a cobweb which the high priestess Mother Gin Sling spins ."Why not Mother Whiskey Soda? " Tierney asks.

All the characters are not what they seem ,they just pretend.Tierney has two names (one of them is the well-chosen "Poppy") and we only learn her real identity in the second half in a scene which seems completely "out of the movie".Mature is Doctor Omar ,doctor of nothing! Even the women in the cages and the sailors who buy them just pretend .Nothing is real.

Tierney's downfall is depicted in lavish detail:from the elegant woman of the beginning to the wreck Gin Sling invites to her Chinese New Year feast .Directing is absolutely breathtaking,when the camera circles around the dive where a cast of thousands -Sternberg even pays a tribute to the extras in the cast and credits,which is rare ,to my knowledge ,the first and last time it had been made-surrounds the heroine ,or in the final scenes ,when the shots merge with the firecrackers of the New Year.

"The Shanghai gesture" may be a guilty pleasure.But this kind of pleasure ,I ask for more!

"The Shanghai Gesture" has an allure and a power that is hard to define.

[ZoraSky · 7/10 · 8 October 2005]

Fascinating. Once I stumbled onto this movie, I could not stop watching it. When it was over, I had find out the title since I had missed the beginning. So I spent my Saturday morning checking the Turner Classic Movie T.V. schedule and then searching the internet to read about "The Shanghai Gesture" and it's director and actors/actresses.

One of my first questions: Who is that playing Mother Gin Sling? I know it is not Marlene Dietrich, but who? Answer: actress Ona Munson aka "Belle Watling" from "Gone With The Wind." I NEVER would have guessed. All sorts of familiar faces showed up in familiar and not so familiar roles. Like the croupier from "Casablanca," presiding over a much more sinister roulette table.

The visuals get you first. Images of a well of depravity leading to ruin and despair, yet glamorous all the way.

I liked the characterizations too. Walter Houston was excellent and believable as the "straight" businessman. Gene Tierney did an amazing transformation from decisive, strong, and elegant socialite to needy, pathetically transparent, and out of control young woman. Ona Munson played an impressive "dragon lady." Victor Mature's gigolo was appropriately jaded and manipulative.

It is a hypnotic and sensuous morality tale about the lure of sex, gambling, drugs, alcohol, and money and the danger of addiction to any of these to one's inner spirit. It also illustrates the high price of revenge, especially misplaced revenge.

A respectable film from the man who directed "The Blue Angel."

This film has an allure and a power that is hard to define. "The Shanghai Gesture" is not perfect, but it seizes hold of your attention and makes one think.

Much better than some reviewers would have you think.

[cheathamg · 7/10 · 20 June 2003]

Most of those movie review reference books you see floating around in paperback call this film campy idiocy. It's campy only in the sense that it was made at a time when a certain degree of heavy-handedness and melodrama was the norm in films. It's certainly not idiotic. It is a story of perceived betrayal and self-degradation. The play it was based on was considered quite thought provoking and socially daring. The film was somewhat cleaned up but still addressed the main issues. The characterizations are quite involving, especially Mature's.

Dreamy von Sternberg Morality Tale...

[cariart · 30 March 2004]

THE SHANGHAI GESTURE displays what was best and worst in Josef von Sternberg's 'German Expressionist' approach to film making, first seen by American audiences in his classic Marlene Dietrich productions of the 1930s. Each setting is decadent and mysterious, shot in soft focus, and wreathed in smoke; a sense of the absurd manifests itself in make-up, hairstyles, and costume; each character postures, incessantly, striking poses before delivering dialog; and there is always an undercurrent of sexual bondage, here manifested in the casual suggestions made by lazy, yet smoldering 'Dr. Omar' (Victor Mature), to the stranded showgirl, 'Dixie' (Phyllis Brooks), and the initially haughty, if naive 'Poppy/Victoria' (Gene Tierney), both of whom he easily 'bends' to his desires. In von Sternberg's world, there are seldom heroes, only survivors and predators.

Set in a fantasy version of the infamous Chinese port, GESTURE gathers a disparate group of international 'types', and sets them down in the multileveled center of inequity, a gambling parlor run by the legendary Chinese 'Mother' Gin Sling (Ona Munson). Ensnared by their debts, the mysterious woman 'owns' them, possessing an extraordinary degree of power.

Then the equally mysterious and powerful Sir Guy Charteris (Walter Huston) arrives in Shanghai, strong enough to control the local government, and with a goal of evicting 'Mother' Gin Sling, and tearing down her property. There is a shared 'skeleton' in both their closets, however, which she will reveal in the film's climactic 'Chinese New Year' dinner party...

While Munson could never 'pass' as Chinese, she does appear exotic and inscrutable, and is actually quite good, as is Huston, displaying a sensitivity masked in arrogant smugness. The true joy of the film, however, is watching the film's younger stars, early in their careers. Victor Mature, at 26, a year after his 'breakthrough' role in ONE MILLION B.C., poses more than acts in his role of an Arab gigolo, but clearly displays the sexuality that would make him a major heartthrob in the 40s; and Gene Tierney, not yet 21, occasionally overplays the 'fall' of her character, yet possesses the luminous beauty that would become her trademark.

Josef von Sternberg would only direct a handful of films after THE SHANGHAI GESTURE (receiving 'on screen' credit in even fewer), and this would be the last film he would have any kind of creative control over.

Faults and all, that alone would make THE SHANGHAI GESTURE worth viewing!

You May Wince, But You Will Watch

[LomzaLady · 7/10 · 11 October 2005]

An amazing movie. The first time I saw it, I couldn't believe what I was watching -- it's so old-fashioned, so racist, so antifeminist, so melodramatic, and yet, it's wonderfully gripping. Here is a story full of clichés about the East, and about the decadence of Shanghai in particular. Part of the fun of watching this film is trying to guess what was left out. There was a Broadway version of Shanghai Gesture in the 1920s, and the protagonist's name in the play, "Mother Goddamn," is so wonderfully evocative of her character. The film's "Mother Gin Sling" doesn't tell her backstory in the same way.

It's obvious that Victor Mature's character is giving Gene Tierney's character more than sex and booze. He is one of those doctors who is an easy source of drugs to the idle rich. Although I think Mature is somewhat miscast as the insidious Persian physician (too robust; too American), he does well, and those supercilious, smoldering looks he gives are entirely appropriate to the situation. Gene Tierney gives a no-holds-barred performance as the girl gone wrong: a spoiled, rude, petulant baby who is in sharp contrast to the so-called "floozy" of the story, who is by far her superior in every way, except economically.

Ona Munson is wonderful as the amoral Mother Gin Sling. Actually, the first time I saw the film I missed the beginning, and I thought the character was being played by Gloria Swanson. I suppose Swanson could have done it equally as well, but probably would have turned down such an unsavory role.

My favorite character is Mike Mazurki as Mother Gin Sling's strongman. Mazurki was a sometime wrestler/actor, who usually played big dumb gangsters, or big dumb policemen. He is very good here as the menacing presence, and looks strong and manly without a shirt, and no doubt without Pilates.

A totally involving window onto how people thought about each other in the past.

Seedy and exotic

[HotToastyRag · 6/10 · 22 September 2018]

As you might guess from the title, The Shanghai Gesture takes place in Shanghai. Ona Munson stars as Mother Gin Sling, who runs a gambling casino. When you watch this drama, you might get the feeling that it's a little watered down to pass the censors, and that's because it was! The original story was much racier, including drugs, cursing, and prostitution, but it had to be dialed down dozens of times before the Hays Code let it pass through to movie audiences.

Hazel Rogers and Robert Stephanoff had their hands full preparing Ona in the makeup chair and with elaborate wig designs. Adding in lavish costumes by Oleg Cassini and Royer, and jewelry by Eugene Joseff, and she really is spectacular to look at. She's plays a villainess who lures Gene Tierney into her casino by offering unlimited credit and free drinks, in order to seek revenge on Gene's father Walter Huston. Why does Ona want revenge? And perhaps the better question is why does Gene become a gambling dope fiend just because she's given unlimited credit and free drinks?

If you like seedy corruption films in an exotic setting, like Barbary Coast, you can give this one a shot. You're going to have to read between the lines, though, but it shouldn't be that hard to do, since the implications are there.

Certainly among the most beautiful films ever

[tpatti · 10/10 · 23 December 2004]

One of the most beautiful films ever made. Von Sternberg had a strange and painterly way of composing a frame when he shot his films. In earlier films the scenes abounded in detail, and often had layers that would stretch back into the distance, or simply add complexity and a sense of the tumult of the living all around. In this film he seemed to change his focus to the glamorous portrait, and brought to life some of the most stunning shots of actors I have ever seen.

If you wish to see the breathtaking beauty of Gene Tierney at its height that this is the film to see it. She's so willful and spoiled, suggesting the nymphomaniac that nobody could suggest any other way thanks to the censorship. Everyone in the film seems to licking their lips in anticipation of some decadent delight that will be happening off screen. And time and time again Sternberg throws up another static, stagy, yet impossibly beautiful portrait of one of his stars.

The scent of opium and sex practically oozes from every frame.

As ripe as a fetid orchid, and almost as pleasurable to watch

[Terrell-4 · 6/10 · 29 June 2008]

Odd flowers come to mind. The Shanghai Gesture seems like another of Josef von Sternberg's ripely fetid orchids, fascinating to observe but which can leave a nasty smell in your nose if you take a sniff. No, perhaps it's like a pitcher plant from the Discovery Channel, cut open so we can watch a fly slide down into a sweet smelling pool of liquid and then be slowly digested while it struggles for life. Wow, that purple prose is almost as good as some of what von Sternberg comes up with. He might have been a master of mise en scene, whatever that catch-all phrase may mean, but his movies can be so ripe, lush and oblivious to what makes a good movie that in some perverse way at least a handful of his films are still interesting. The Scarlet Empress, for example, is so over the top with such a sly and amusingly lewd performance by Marlene Dietrich that even Criterion has blessed it. The Shanghai Gesture is not all that good, but it is so seriously fervid, so stuffed with oozing melodrama and contains so many fascinating performances, some excellent and some not, that the movie just keeps striding through its 99 minutes.

We're in Shanghai in the International Settlement. Mother Gin Sling, a dragon lady who rose from poverty and enslaved prostitution now owns the most elegant, the largest, and the richest casino in town. She's a powerful woman. She knows everything that needs knowing about the important foreign men in Shanghai who come to be flattered and gamble at her establishment. She knows quite a bit about their wives, too. Sir Guy Charteris, however, who is new to Shanghai, is buying up property to turn into a rich new development, and that will include Mother Gin Sling's establishment. Charteris has a lovely young daughter, just out of finishing school. She's beautiful, impulsive, spoiled and is used to her father's money. She loves the idea of dark thrills. She's soon to become a pawn between Mother Gin Sling and Charteris, who doesn't realize that long ago the young Chinese girl he married and lost was...yes, Mother Gin Sling. 'Mother' will get her revenge on this man, all right, but Charteris has a secret of his own. You'll never guess, of course. It all comes together at an elegant Chinese New Year's dinner party hosted by 'Mother,' with firecrackers going off outside in the streets, girls in basket cages hoisted up outside her window to be bid on by eager rickshaw drivers and cold revenge served up as the main course

The quality of the movie is as variable as the acting. Walter Huston as Charteris is excellent. He was a commanding actor and always interesting to watch. He might be remembered by most nowadays as the old coot Howard, smarter than them all, in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, but watch him in Dodsworth. As Sam Dodsworth he's touching and unforgettable.

Ona Munson as the vengeance-driven, hardened Mother Gin Sling, however, is just caricature. At times her line reading sounds like Mae West was playing the part. Sternberg gives her a lacquered hairdo that would make Medusa envious. As the smooth Doctor Omar, one of Mother Gin Sling's many corrupt employees, Victor Mature does a surprisingly good job. With his fleshy lips, sleepy eyes and wearing evening clothes, he looks the part. He has to contend with some silly lines to say, a ridiculous fez to wear and what appears to be a silk bed sheet tossed around his shoulders. Gene Tierney, beautiful, carefully photographed, stunning to see, simply can't act. She manages as the spoiled Victoria Charteris, but as the corrupted Poppy Smith, even when she's trying her best, she just can't handle the part. The secondary actors range from awkward, obvious portrayals to the fine work of Eric Blore as a genuinely offensive sycophant who belongs to 'Mother,' Albert Basserman as an aged and worldly commissioner and Mike Mazurki as a big, big Chinese coolee who does with sullen pleasure what 'Mother' tells him to.

To give some sympathy to Sternberg, the Hollywood Code required him to make Victoria's downfall the result of being led by Doctor Omar to gambling and liquor. This makes her degradation at the hands of Mother Gin Sling seem a little lightweight. In the play, of course, Omar led her to sex and opium.

Still, you can't beat the last scene in the movie. The secrets have been exposed, a shooting has taken place, the 'best' people in Shanghai have fled 'Mother's' party and the fireworks are exploding. Amidst all this the sweaty, bare-chested Mazurki turns to Sir Guy as they stand in the crowded street and asks, "Likee Chinee New Year?"

A beautiful, fascinating melodramatic story

[pzanardo · 9/10 · 3 July 2000]

"The Shanghai Gesture" shows how attractive can be a melodramatic story when treated by an artist as Josef von Sternberg. The movie is in the style of German Expressionism; luckily enough, it avoids the slowness and bleak heaviness which affect many movies of that artistic movement, probably since it was filmed in Hollywood instead of Berlin. We are introduced in a world of desperate corruption; every sense of honesty or nobility is dead. It is typical that Mother Gin Sling's casino, the den of every meanness, is intended to be closed not for moral but for business reasons. There is a clever mixture of tragedy and grotesque. Ona Munson is extraordinary as Mother Gin Sling: she apparently knows shameful secrets of the whole cosmopolitan mob which throngs her casino; she has everyone into her claws. Her make-up and Chinese robes are magnificent; her fixed, cruel smile is really scaring. Victor Mature is great in the role of the indifferent, over-lazy Dr. Omar. He is probably black-mailed by Mother Gin Sling, like any other character in the movie; yet he seems to do evil just as an entertaining game, just to win his bore, not by coercion. Gene Tierney is Poppy, the spoiled, rich, scornful girl, just too apt to sink in a pit of corruption, with no possible coming back. A due remark: we are always so stunned by Gene's incredible beauty, that we find it difficult to realize her great talent. Here, at the age of twenty-one, she gives a fully mature performance. Also Walter Huston and all the supporting actors make beautiful jobs. Actually, the acting is always on the verge of grotesque: this is clearly an artistic choice by von Sternberg. If we can find a fault in "The Shanghai Gesture", is that the finale is a bit abrupt. Nonetheless it is a great film, deservedly a cult-movie in the history of cinema.

"All roads lead to Shanghai, but not everyone is welcomed so officially"

[ackstasis · 6/10 · 4 April 2009]

Having just watched 'The Shanghai Gesture (1941),' I'm not even sure what to make of it. Was it a good film? Was it a complete mess? The 100 minutes unfolded like a drug-induced haze, the alluring scent of an opiate hanging thickly in the air. Somehow, the film's plot – whatever it may have been about – seemed totally and utterly inconsequential, with director Josef von Sternberg placing additional, almost superfluous, importance on the development of mood. Indeed, aside from atmosphere, there's little else to keep you watching the film: the characters are sleazy and grotesque, the sort you'd expect to find at a seedy casino, its employees imbued with the mock dignity of one who deals exclusively in exploiting the weaknesses of lesser men. A good cast – Walter Huston, Gene Tierney, Victor Mature, Eric Blore – is not exactly wasted on such poorly-developed characters, but one gets the sense that even they are not exactly sure what they're doing in this place. But, if the film is a failure, then it's a genuinely fascinating one.

'Mother' Gin Sling (Ona Munson, in unflattering Oriental make-up) is the mysterious and ruthless owner of a Shanghai casino, where desperate men come night or day to gamble their lives and fortunes. Employee Doctor Omar (Victor Mature) does his best to charm the beautiful girls who come his way, in one night snagging both smart-talking American Dixie (Phyllis Brooks) and conceited rich-girl "Poppy" (Gene Tierney). When threatened with closure by wealthy entrepreneur Sir Guy Charteris (Walter Huston), Gin Sling springs into action, using her enormous influence to rebuff the challenge. 'The Shanghai Gesture' is sometimes categorised as film noir. Certainly, other noir pictures like 'Macao (1952),' which Josef von Sternberg directed until he was replaced by Nicholas Ray, utilised a similarly exotic Asian setting, so the non-American locale doesn't immediately preclude it from consideration. In some ways, it fits the bill: every character in the film has a weakness – something to hide – through which they can be manipulated; a shady past that has come back to haunt them.

Despite being restricted by the provisions of the Production Code, 'The Shanghai Gesture' is one of the sleaziest films of its era, leaving a bitter, uneasy taste in the mouth, despite impeccable production values. Hollywood's interpretation of Eastern cultural values was evidently unflattering, and every Asian character is utterly devoid of morals, with particularly prominence given to the proudly misogynistic attitudes of one Chinese employee who likes to brag of his polygyny. A shocking history of sex slavery is exposed, with New Year's Eve guests treated to a recreation of these ghastly practices (or, at least, we're told that it is merely a recreation). But it isn't only the Chinese whose immorality is exposed, and even the seemingly upright Sir Guy betrays a suspect past, doomed finally to suffer for his alleged sins. Walter Huston is excellent as always, bringing conviction to a film in which everybody else seems uncertain of their roles. Gene Tierney, perhaps her most ravishing performance outside 'Laura (1944),' isn't particularly convincing, but her falseness does strangely work, given the desperate phoniness of her character.

Unintentionally Campy Von Sternberg

[samgrass-3 · 2/10 · 21 August 2010]

If what is meant by the Shanghai Gesture is giving the middle finger to the audience, then this Von Sternberg film hits the target. This is a pathetic piece of celluloid that at times threatens to disintegrate into a complete laugh riot. Get this – Poppy (Gene Tierney) is out for a night's fun in Shanghai when she stumbles into the sin emporium of Mother Gin Sling (Originally Mother Godamm in the play). Mother, played so over the top by Ona Munson (yet another Asian with blue eyes) is taking a role Von Sternberg would have given to Anna May Wong in the 30s (she would ave done far better), with a variation of Poppy being played by Marlene Dietrich. The casino, with its Art Deco decor, is more suited to Los Angeles than Shanghai. Best of all is the awaited entrance of Mother Gin Sling. Though Von Sternberg clearly wants it to be show stopping, all it does is remind us of when the curtain went up on King Kong in New York. And with a hairdo and dress that looks like her stylist was Cher. Meanwhile,Poppy has fallen under the spell of Doctor Omar (Victor Mature). If you want a real belly laugh, check out Mature in this role. Peter Lorre as Doctor Omar, okay, but Victor Mature? At any rate, Omar leads Poppy into an ever-spiraling addiction to gambling and drugs. And he works fast, considering that the movie is only 98 minutes long. Now enter Sir Guy Charteris (Walter Huston), in a role clearly evoking Sydney Greenstreet. Seems Sir Guy has bought a large slice of Shanghai, including the ground on which Mother has her den of inequity, so Mother has to vamoose from the premises by the coming Chinese New Year. (Von Sternberg's great for this sort of plotting.) Not so fast, however, for Mother Gin Sling suddenly remembers that she was once married to Sir Guy and that he abandoned her while taking her family's fortune. Amazingly, Sir Guy does not recognize her; guess all Chinese look the same to him. Mother plans her revenge by inviting Sir Guy to a Chinese New Year's party he'll never forget. At the party, Sir Guy turns the tables by revealing to Mother that, indeed, she is a mother: Poppy is their daughter! How Gin Sling couldn't accurately remember giving birth is just one of those things the audience has to overlook. Well, Mother's just not the mothering type, if you know what I mean, so we can all guess what happens to dear Poppy. By the way, also check out the hat Mother wears throughout the film. She looks like something out of a broken down carnival.

Bizarre, Oneiric, Magnificent!!!! DO NOT MISS THIS!!!!

[bragant · 10/10 · 6 November 2009]

This masterwork - unleashed on a bewildered American public shortly after Pearl Harbor - is without doubt one of the most lurid, corrupt and depraved motion pictures ever produced in Old Hollywood - and there is not a curse word or a nude scene to be found! This movie seems to exude a hallucinatory atmosphere reeking of opium smoke, stained silk and half-finished cocktails. You will literally not believe what you are seeing - and that's not a bad thing. An independent production, THE SHANGHAI GESTURE took over 15 years to make it from Broadway to the big screen. The hit play's themes of sexual depravity, prostitution, greed and drug addiction of course could not be presented in a direct fashion due to the Production Code, and various scripts kicked around for a decade before Austrian producer Arnold Pressburger acquired the rights and hired his friend, Josef Von Sternberg, to direct. A legend thanks to his discovery of Marlene Dietrich, the fabled director of THE BLUE ANGEL had fallen on hard times by 1940 - he had not completed a film in several years, had suffered a nervous breakdown, and had expended the bulk of his fortune to help about 30 members of his extended family flee the Third Reich for Switzerland. Sternberg's autocratic mannerisms and insistence on absolute control did nothing to make him more employable. THE SHANGHAI GESTURE was to be Sternberg's last major Hollywood production. The budget for this film was far less than what he had once enjoyed at Paramount, but despite this limitation, Sternberg infuses every frame with his unique look, as well as giving us one of the most astonishing crane shots in the history of the cinema. This film also contains some of the most gorgeous close-ups ever, and the massive casino set is justly revered. This is a movie you watch in black-and-white but remember in color - it is THAT beautiful (note the review below where the writer discusses the "gold" mirrored screens and "black" lacquer of Mother's dining room). The plot revolves around the degradation of Victoria Charteris (aka "Poppy Smith") at the hands of the sinister Mother Gin Sling, owner of the most luxurious gambling den in Shanghai. Mother seeks to destroy Poppy as vengeance against Poppy's father, Sir Guy, who has ordered the closure of Mother's casino, but in the end she gets more than she bargained for...A very young and celestially beautiful Gene Tierney handles Poppy's transformation from sophisticated femme du monde to coarse, drunken slut with aplomb, while Ona Munson turns in the performance of her life as "Mother." Kudos also must go to Victor Mature, who reeks of sleaze and sex as his "Dr." Omar leads Poppy down the primrose path...To those who decry this film as "racist," please bear in mind that Sternberg had traveled frequently in East Asia in the 1930s, was a connoisseur of Chinese art, and knew exactly what he was doing. This movie depicts a pleasure- and money-mad European colonial society in a state of total moral bankruptcy, a world on the verge of complete collapse from its own inner rot and decay, and it cannot be a coincidence that European colonialism in Asia was destroyed by the Japanese within weeks of this film's release. Sternberg is very careful to depict the colonials as the racist, ignorant fools that they for the most part were (note the scene where the etiolated casino money-counter uses pidgin despite the fact that the Chinese man to whom he speaks is obviously fluent in the King's English), and in Shanghai, corruption is a way of life for all, regardless of race or nationality. This film is in fact a tale of revenge against the European occupier and his exploitations. Sternberg was a master of indirection and implication, and every line here has two and sometimes three meanings. You will find it very hard to believe that this was actually made in 1941, and you will wonder how it got past the censors. Years ahead of its time, this should be considered the first true "noir" and deserves to be much more widely known than it is. A dreamlike masterwork like nothing you have ever seen, you will not be able to stop watching this once you begin. Remember, Mother Gin Sling's casino never closes...

The Dark Side of Human Nature

[sol-kay · 7/10 · 6 August 2011]

***SPOILERS*** Originally on Broadway in 1926 "The Shanghai Gesture" was a lot hotter and spicier hen it was made into a movie some 15 years later. The play involved drugs prostitution and a high class whore house that was replaced by Mother Gin Sing's Casino in the very sanitized, due to the Hollywood Hayes Commission, movie version.

In the move Mother Gin Sing, Ona Munson, who runs a very profitable casino in downtown Shanghai is threatened to be evicted by big time British land developer Sir Guy Charteris, Walter Huston, who plans to convert it into a luxury high rise overlooking the South china Sea. While running her casino Mother Gin Sing spots this English woman Poppy, Gene Terney, at the bar and immediately takes a shine to her. Getting Poppy drunk on drinks thats on the house Mother Gin Sing encourages her to gamble the night away giving Poppy unlimited credit where she ends up getting as much as 20,000 Bitish pounds in debt.

What we in the audience as well as Poppy don't know is that Moher Gin Sing is hatching a plan that in the end will save her casino from being foreclosed and taken over by Sir Guy! And it's that sinister and evil plan that's she's planning to lay on the unsuspecting Sir Guy at the closing party for the by then defunct casino on the forthcoming Chinese New year that he Poppy and a number of other Shanghai luminaries are invited to attend!

The movie is a take on Dante's Inferno where hell is a casino where there's no end to the action and where the action never ends. We see people playing the tables for what seems like eternity never running out of money with money being by far the cheapest commodity in the place. The big surprise is at the going away party when Mother Gin Sing spills the beans of Sir Guy in what a low life heel he really is in what he did to her when she was a young girl some 20 years earlier.

****SPOILERS*** The by far biggest surprise in the film is what Mother Gin Sing's relationship is with Poppy that Sir Guy's been hiding for her all these years. The revelations that Sir Guy brings out is so shocking that it leads Mother Gin Sing to completely flip out and end up doing something that not even her money status and political and police connections can cover up or get her out of.

Strange casting in the movie with Victor Mature looking as if he's stoned on pot as this spaced out looking guy called Doctor Omar who thinks he's a poet but, like those of us listening to his corny lyrics, really doesn't have the talent to be one. There's also in the movie cast the hulking and non Asiatic looking, with a deep Florida suntan, ex-professional wrestler Mike Mazurki playing of all people a Chinese coolie.

It's amazing this film didn't kill Gene Tierney's career

[planktonrules · 3/10 · 25 September 2010]

"The Shanghai Gesture" is one of those weird Hollywood films that is set in China--yet practically no one in the film appears to be Asian--at least when it comes to the major characters! And, in the few cases where there are Asian main characters, they are clearly played by American actors--such as Ona Munson (in completely ridiculous garb) and Mike Mazurki! This WAS the norm for the 1930s and 40s--and even continued into the 50s and 60s (with Tony Randall and 6'^7" Christopher Lee, of all people, playing Chinese men)...how this sort of casting was never a major issue is beyond me--it certainly would not be acceptable to have white actors playing black characters. Plus, there were some fine Asian actors that would have loved the work! In addition to this bizarro casting wasn't enough, Victor Mature plays a guy who sports a fez and cape--and is called 'Omar'! Wow--only in Hollywood!

It's pretty obvious that this film was originally a play, as just about everything occurs in a gambling den in Shanghai. The way scenes are presented has this stagy feel. But, the original play was MUCH more racy and tons of the plot needed to be changed to meet the demands of the Production Code. For instance, in the play, the setting was a brothel! So, they had to sanitize the script in order to get approval to show this movie in American theaters.

If you think about it, this setting is very much like 1942's "Casablanca"--it,too, is set in a gambling den and bar. Its patrons are very multinational and there is a strong undercurrent of vice. But, there is a style, dialog and a great ensemble cast in "Casablanca" that puts it in a completely different league than "The Shanghai Gesture".

The film finds Tierney in the gambling den and the seemingly nice Mature prods her to try her hand at gambling. At first, she wins big and wants to cash in her chips and leave, but he convinces her to continue. Not only does she lose all her money and jewelry, but has been extended lots of credit--and there appears to be no way she can ever repay the loans. Obviously Mature has pushed her into this situation so that she will owe her soul (and body) to the proprietress, 'Mother Gin Sling' (Munson). And yet, oddly, Tierney throws herself at Mature! What a dummy!

Later, after throwing a ridiculous temper-tantrum, Tierney goes to see her father--the man who thinks he's going to shut down the 'gambling house' and deport its owner. Now, however, Tierney's debt makes this seem doubtful. How all this is worked out at a kooky dinner party is something you can find out for yourself...if you really care! Frankly, I stopped caring only about halfway through this silly film.

Now let's talk about Mother Gin Sling. I probably am not allowed to use the name the play originally used for her--IMDb doesn't allow swearing in the reviews. You really have to see her to believe it--she looks like something out of a sci-fi film--like the original "Flash Gordon" or "The Fifth Element"! Her hair and silly makeup just have to be seen to believed. And, she looks laughable...and about as Asian as a taco!

As for Tierney, this film is early in her career so I guess we can't blame her too much for her bad acting (particulary at around the 60 minute mark)--really, really bad acting. She goes from a cool and sexy lady to a totally annoying child who makes you want to backhand her--she was THAT annoying and her performance that shallow! Frankly, it was embarrassing to watch her and I am amazed that I was able to keep watching...though I am a glutton for punishment!

To put it bluntly, a pretty stupid film without a lot to recommend it. Perhaps the big confrontation scene between Munson and Walter Huston might provide some decent entertainment...but I doubt it.

In my top 15

[lucy-19 · 27 November 2003]

Don't believe anyone who tells you this movie is bad - it is wonderful. The casino set with its art deco sculptures is a work of art and the music is superb. The play the script is based on is by John P. Marquand, who wrote the Mr. Moto books. I think in the original Poppy becomes addicted to drugs as well as to Dr. Omar. Gene Tierney is great as the girl who slides into degeneracy. All the ensemble cast are wonderful: the earthy chorus girl, the sinister old Chinese man who says he admires white women for their "intelligence and sense of humour" as his hands outline a voluptuous figure in the air. Mike Mazurski as a thug who acts as an ever-present Fate figure haunting Sir Guy Charteris (Walter Huston). The elderly notable who regrets so politely that he must close Mother Gin Sling's operation down. Mother G herself with her bitter, drawling voice that has foresuffered all. See it if you can! This film is art! (Oh, I forgot the smiling character who plays Chopin in the casino/brothel.)

Bizarre, exotic drama

[AlsExGal · 7/10 · 20 December 2022]

In the polyethnic city of Shanghai, various unusual characters cross paths in the gambling den of Mother Gin Sling (Ona Munson). These include rich girl Poppy (Gene Tierney), womanizer Dr. Omar (Victor Mature), stranded chorus girl Dixie (Phyllis Brooks), and many others. Things get complicated when English businessman Sir Guy Charteris (Walter Huston) buys the block containing Gin Sling's place and he orders the place shut down. Also featuring Albert Bassermann, Eric Blore, Ivan Lebedeff, Mike Mazurki, Michael Dalmatoff, and Maria Ouspenskaya as the Amah.

This fairly lurid stuff, obviously neutered a bit by the Production Code, but still managing to be salacious enough to upset some. This ended up being the final completed American film for director Josef von Sternberg. Munson as dragon lady Gin Sling is a riot, with her ridiculous hair-style certainly memorable. Gene Tierney looks terrific, while Victor Mature looks appropriately sleazy. I'm not sure how good this really was, but it was outrageous enough to entertain me quite a bit. It earned Oscar nominations for Best Art Direction, and Best Score (Richard Hageman). One unusual bit about the movie is this entry at the end of the films opening credits: "And a large cast of "HOLLYWOOD EXTRAS" who without expecting credit or mention stand ready day and night to do their best - - and who at their best are more than good enough to deserve mention."

The Shanghai Gesture review

[JoeytheBrit · 6/10 · 23 April 2020]

Atmospheric but stagy drama set in a Shanghai casino that's portrayed as a version of hell. Ona Munson stands in for Dietrich, director Von Sternberg's favourite actress, and you can't help but feel his heart wasn't really in it as a result. It looks and feels like an early '30s movie at times, but has some impressive moments. Not great, but me (kind of) likee.

One of A Kind: My Favorite Guilty Pleasure Defies Criticism!

[museumofdave · 8/10 · 24 March 2013]

Sometimes I just put my reasoned critic to bed and grab my DVD of Shanghai Gesture for an evening of irrational delight. This extravagant, unhinged, twisted and sometimes terrible film is my Guilty Pleasure, a confession I honor by giving it a higher rating than it probably deserves.

When this bizarre film was made, Hollywood, still under the yoke of a stringent production code, could not tackle many taboo subjects and thus director Josef Von Sternberg could only hint at them. The brothel, for instance, where the original Broadway play was set, becomes a gambling den (although girls in bamboo cages are dangled outside!) Any hints of drug use were forbidden, so Gene Tierney's opium-addled, spoiled monster of a daughter is named "Poppy" (as in Opium), and the owner of the casino, formerly Mother "G-D" is now called Mother Gin Sling...and so on. Most of America was flocking to see Mickey Rooney in The Hardy Family series, a happy product from MGM. Shanghai Gesture is hardly mainstream.

This strange film was not made at a major studio, but produced by Arnold Pressburger, who did manage to sign an amazing assemblage of major character actors to enact a plot of ultimate revenge. There's Victor Mature, hiding in his capacious burnoose, sleazy in a fez, playing Dr. Omar, seducer of the innocent, or Ona Munson, remembered by some viewers as good-hearted bordello gal Belle Watling in Gone With The Wind, sporting a series of Hollywood's most outrageous wigs. And there's Walter Huston with a gimpy arm, and even acting instructor Maria Ouspenskaya, wordless as "The Amah."

The sets alone are worth the viewing, from the initial shot of Madame Gin Sling's gambling den, a Deco vortex of gambling activity sucking you into an absurd plot loaded with illogical coincidence. This frenzied Asian Fantasy, which has little to do with reality, and everything to do with Out-Of-Control Style can be great fun and is sometimes admirable for the right reasons.

"You likee Chinee New Year?" says Mike Mazurki, usually seen in films as a two-bit gangster, here a shirtless bouncer who has seldom been better! One caveat: Criterion needs to get their hands on this one and turn out a decent print--the DVD quality is, at best, mediocre! But I want my Shanghai Gesture anyway!

A decadent film from the 40's.

[kvnbhovis · 6/10 · 5 January 2014]

I watched this film tonight for the first time. I have very mixed feelings about it. I think Josef von Sternberg was one brilliant director. More on him later. I thought all of the actors did a fine job except for Gene Tierney. I don't understand why Victor Mature gets a bad rap from so many people. Everything I've seen him in, he's always done a fine job. The Robe, My Darling Clementine, Kiss of Death, Samson and Delilah and his performance in After the Fox is great! He steals that film from Peter Sellers just as he stole the Robe from Richard Burton. Plus that guy invented the killer grin long before Tom Cruise. In his role here, he fills the role quite well. He is so wonderfully self-absorbed and sleazy. Some people says he is miscast. I say no he isn't. In his back-story, he is a Syrian of mixed heritage. Mature was of Italian extract and could pass as a Greek or Turk. Syria is hardly a stone's throw from Turkey. I don't want to drone on about him but this is my first post and I'm sick and tired of people giving him the shaft. Not that too many here did for this movie but there were a few.

Ona Munson did pretty much steal the show with her Medusa hairdress. What the heck was that about? Huston did a fine job. Its really a weird thing about him. He could be so wooden at times especially in the early talkies and then so dynamic in The Devil and Daniel Webster and The Treasure of the Sierra Madre. Here he's not given much to do but what he does, he does well.

And then there's Gene Tierney. Her entrance is grand. Von Sternberg never had a more beautiful subject. She plays the early portion of the film very well. Very cool, sensuous with a decided interest in the decadent. But then when she sinks into despair and ruin, her performance deteriorates. She is annoying in her depravity and overacts unconvincingly. It was a very abrupt transformation and I can't help but think that maybe the Hayes Code had insisted on certain cuts so as not to emphasize her transformation into a degenerate. However that does not excuse the melodramatics of the latter half of the film. She is just unbearable. I can't place the full blame on her. Von Sternberg deserves his share of the blame for her performance. He could have guided her better so that she wouldn't have produced the histrionics. Surely he could have seen in the daily rushes that these histrionics were a detriment to the film. I don't know but I find it almost inexcusable as he was such a great director.

I haven't seen all of his films yet but I have seen Morocco, The Blue Angel, Underworld and The Last Command and I think I can make a good judgment about how good he was at his craft. The Blue Angel and Morocco were excellent films but they didn't particularly impress me. However, the last two films of his that I saw did. Underworld and The Last Command are brilliant and the photography in those films particularly impressed me. I can't say that I've seen a better gangster film than Underworld and I've seen most of them from Walsh's Regeneration to Scorcese's Goodfellas. The Last Command is a revelation. Jannings performance is excellent and I wasn't terribly impressed with his performance in the Blue Angel. Von Sternberg was at the top of his craft here. I don't give 10's to many films but I would give a 10 to both of those. Maybe he is so great in those films because they were silent. He didn't have to rely on dialogue. Unfortunately the Shanghai Gesture was based on a stage play and the staginess had to creep in.

Von Sternberg had to know that this film was a make or break film for him. He only got to direct this film through the help of a friend after years on inactivity following the Dietrich period and the tragedy of the incomplete I, Claudius. I just don't understand why he didn't guide Tierney's performance better. I've seen a lot of her films and I think she was more than capable.

And this film did break him. Whether it was the cuts or Tierney's performance or a combination of both, the film was not a success. He only got to direct a couple films for Howard Hughes after this film and they were not displays for his talent. Howard Hughes had complete control over those films and they were more or less his vision.

Such a shame that he didn't get a chance to direct more. He did do a great job on this film otherwise. It had the proper decadent mood and atmosphere. Luckily, Gene Tierney, even with all of her problems, had a bright future still ahead of her.

It didn't help that the version I saw on an Image DVD was a very mediocre transfer with bad sound. Despite its flaws, it deserves a restoration and maybe I'll be kinder to it in the future. I cannot give this film a 7 as much as I want to. It is just too disjointed, because of cuts I presume, and because of Tierney's performance. I would give it a 6.9 though but because IMDb doesn't allow it, I have to give it a 6. It is definitely worth viewing though I would not buy it until a better transfer comes along.

A tragic story with quite the entertaining group of characters

[bensonmum2 · 8/10 · 30 April 2006]

'Mother' Gin Sling (Ona Munson) runs a very successful gambling house in Shanghai. Through her doors pass a wide variety of individuals from every exotic corner of the globe. One such individual is a spoiled young woman who goes by the name of "Smith" (Gene Tierney) with a penchant for gambling and drink. It's not long before "Smith" is up to her eyeballs in IOUs and well on her way to becoming a complete lush. Coinciding with these events, a wealthy man named Sir Charteris (Walter Huston) arrives in Shanghai. Part of his business deal involves the land that 'Mother' Gin Sling's establishment sits on. 'Mother' Gin Sling believes she may have previously met Sir Charteris, but under a different name and in far different circumstances. To save her business, 'Mother' Gin Sling puts two and two together to connect "Smith" with Sir Charteris and lets the chips fall where they may.

Many of the people who care about and enjoy older films like The Shanghai Gesture will no doubt pick-up the film because of Gene Tierney - the biggest "star" in the cast. But they'll quickly discover that The Shanghai Gesture is so much more than Tierney. The movie features a wonderful ensemble cast playing a group of highly eccentric characters. To begin with, there's Ona Munson as 'Mother' Gin Sling. Maybe it's the costuming and maybe it's the attitude, but I bought her performance. Next, there's Victor Mature as Dr. Omar the Arab gigolo. He's the kind of fellow best described as slimy. Two of my favorite characters in The Shanghai Gesture are Eric Blore as Ceasar the English bookkeeper to 'Mother' Gin Sling and Clyde Filmore as 'Mother' Gin Sling's flunky, Percival Montgomery Howe. Mix in an American showgirl, a Russian barkeeper, a rickshaw driver of questionable origin, and about a half-dozen others and you've got quite an eclectic and entertaining group of actors and characters.

As much fun as the people in the film are, at its core, The Shanghai Gesture is a terribly tragic and sad story. Most of the people who come to 'Mother' Gin Sling's place do so because they have to, not because they want to. Whether it's "Smith" looking for her next gambling fix or those who do her bidding like Dixe the American showgirl, they come because 'Mother' Gin Sling holds something over their heads. Nobody seems to really want to be there. Deep down, most of these people seem miserable. The ending of The Shanghai Gesture takes the bleakness from just beneath the surface and thrusts it into the light of day. I won't give it away, but I will say that there are no winners in The Shanghai Gesture. Everyone comes out a loser.

Finally, one of the most impressive aspects of The Shanghai Gesture is the set design. Instead of a seedy, back-alley sort of gambling joint, 'Mother' Gin Sling's place is like an Art Deco shrine. I'm continually amazed at the care and money that went into these sets found in films from the 30s and 40s. Today, much of it would be done with computer effects. So when I see something like the four-story, circular gambling house in The Shanghai Gesture, I can't help be amazed.

The Shanghai Royale

[hrkepler · 6/10 · 21 May 2018]

The movie takes place in shady, but lavishing casino in Shanghai - the city where all sorts of people with usually shady past are together. The visual style of the movie is wonderful - one of the most grand casinos ever shown on the silver screen. The story is interesting and thrilling, although heavy handed and overly melodramatic, but it isn't distracting. It rather adds more othreworldly feel to already fairy tale like casino atmosphere with quirky characters. The film is outdated by the sense that Chinese people are played by the caucasians, but I still can't see anyone else playing Mother Gin Sling than magnificent Ona Munson. Gene Tierney is always eyecandy as lady in trouble. And Victor Mature - an actor who is always interesting to watch being disinterested and bored.

Far from being von Sternberg's best, but it is a wonderful film noir exercise, and as it is little different than other well known film noir's 'The Shanghai Gesture' is highly reccomended to the aficionados of the genre.

Grade B movie Misses

[TedA-2 · 2/10 · 3 November 2001]

Probably the most unusual aspect of Shanghai Gesture is the tribute to extras at the end of the titles. Clearly Josef Von Sternberg was entranced with the image of the roulette table in the pit of a gambling den and this scene is repeated several times through the course of the movie. The titles reflect this respect for the everyman aspect of movie making calling characters "The Bartender", "The Bookkeeper" and so forth even though many of the characters have names.

Plotwise, Shanghai Gesture leaves much to be desired. Stagy and wordy it does not have much modern appeal. It was adapted from a stage play, which is evident when much of the "action" occurs as people sit around at dinner tables and talk, as people sit at bars and talk as they sit at poker tables and talk. The Gene Tierney character has the emotional depth and reactions of a two year old.

Ona Munson is encumbered with the most fantastical hairdos ever seen without exception. The burden of the old studio system is evident as many of the close-up scenes were clearly shot at a later date and mesh most awkwardly with the scene in which they are embedded.

Opulent, Picturesque, Over-the-Top Melodrama

[JohnHowardReid · 10/10 · 12 June 2009]

John Colton who co-authored Rain, the stage adaptation of the short story titled "Miss Thompson" by W. Somerset Maugham, was also solely responsible for another huge Broadway success, The Shanghai Gesture, a legend in 1926 theatregoing. On the other hand, the 1941 movie, directed and photographed (as the credits plainly state) by Josef von Sternberg (Paul Ivano was his camera operator), lost such a large amount of money, it permanently damaged his reputation. Pictorially, the movie is a noir masterpiece. The director has a great time with his opulently picturesque sets, peopled with a vast number of colorful Hollywood extras. Given the full von Sternberg treatment of soft, caressing lighting, Gene Tierney looks absolutely ravishing. Most attractively costumed, she plays up the melodramatic aspects of the plot to the hilt and is only distanced by Ona Munson who rivets our attention while she makes mincemeat of all the dialogue's best lines. Oddly, Victor Mature, of all people, ranks third to Munson and Tierney in the splendid acting department. He plays a rare unsympathetic role with amazing conviction and hits just the right note of superficial self-assurance. In the fall-guy role, Walter Huston enacts the man of the moment with his customary bravado, but is constantly out-pipped by many of the great support players like Phyllis Brooks and particularly Mike Mazurki who has the movie's famous fade-out line, "You likee Chinese New Year?"

Overwrought pulp melodrama

[djensen1 · 7/10 · 14 January 2006]

Strange and sometimes beautiful sets are populated with the unlikeliest of actors in some terrible miscasting to create a nearly surreal melodrama about a Chinese gambling house. Victor Mature in particular is simply wrong for the role of Dr. Omar, a Lothario and probable opium dealer with clumsy designs on the luminous and lovely, but wildly-overacting, Gene Tierney as well as a loudmouthed blonde tramp.

The alluring Mother Gin Sling runs the casino with the strangest methods ever, extending credit to suicidal patrons and spoiled society girls with no credentials. She's threatened with eviction by the new lawman but has a clever plan to stay in business (murder? no: a dinner party). The direction is ham-fisted; the editing choppy; and the story is a melange of noir and crime pulp that meanders from character to character with no discernible protagonist.

Be prepared for hilarious speakee-Chinee racism and some camp 1940s slang. You'll have to read between the lines of the Hays Code for the sex and drugs, but where else will you ever find girls hoisted in cages for Chinese sailors to bid on? ("You understand, of course, this is staged purely for the tourists.") What's frustrating is that, with better direction, this could have been a clever and nasty romp. Phyllis Brooks is a peach, but the loudmouthed broad act is stretched thin. Oregonian Ona Munson is about as Chinese as Portland cement. Characters guffaw for no reason. Long stretches go by with awkward pauses. The music is used sparingly and only to bludgeon. Firecrackers substitute for a score for about 30 minutes of the film.

If you're interested in the genre of Manchu crime pulp melodrama, it's worth a look. But if you're looking for a bit of high-quality 1940s escapism, look elsewhere.

Pathetic Acting

[ozlock · 3/10 · 8 October 2005]

With the exception of Walter Houston, the acting would make a high school production look like academy award stuff. Victor Mature should not be faulted because he is rotten in everything. Phyllis Brooks would not get the part in a primary school production.

I confess that the director is a master at creating mood, however he should have suggested acting lessons instead. Gin Sling's makeup is outrageous but it fits the mood he has attempted to establish.

Ouspenskia is a joy to see no matter what she does, whether you can understand the speech or not.

I see no reason why everyone has to look Chinese. It's not a Chinese movie otherwise it would have sub titles.