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Gilda (1946)

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95 comments in total

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51 out of 60 people found the following comment useful :-
Nothing from our era seems to compare, 21 June 2002
Author: scotty12

The 40s and 50s produced many alluring performances from beautiful and sexy actresses and Rita Hayworth's in Gilda is one of the most provocative of all. The film is good and quite deep, the male leads are better, but Hayworth's performance is simply stunning and unforgettable. She may not have been the most beautiful 40s actress (Gene Tierney and Veronica Lake were more classic beauties imo), but if you look closely her ability to show the sweet, the vulnerable, and especially the wanton, in women has not been bettered. Somehow her character gets under the male viewer's skin in the same way as it does to the male characters in the film.

Modern film femme fatales are a pale shadow by comparison, for example Linda Fiorentino or Sharon Stone. I'm not sure why. It could be either that nowadays allure is too much equated with sex or nudity (less tantalising than several dashes of suggestion) or maybe it's that present day equivalents are portrayed as hard as nails without the necessary mix of sadness and vulnerability.

Whatever, if you've never appreciated what the appeal of 40s noir is, this is definitely one to try.

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42 out of 54 people found the following comment useful :-
Put the Blame on that Dress, 25 August 2002

Author: four_star_diva from San Francisco, CA

And to think there used to be movies without graphic sex scenes that still got the point across, and how. The sexual tension between Ford and Hayworth in this movie is enough to make you run for the cold showers.

Hayworth is gorgeous and so is Ford. They are so good together and in this movie they are positively great. When great screen lovers are mentioned, I've often wondered why Ford and Hayworth aren't among them.

This is one of my absolute favorites.

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31 out of 37 people found the following comment useful :-
Uniqueness descending into the ordinary, 18 April 2004

Author: Gary170459 from Derby, UK

This is one of my all time favourite films, much watched with all its faults. Even the best things can't be faultless but any faults can be more easily overlooked.

There is no golden age film I've seen quite like Gilda, full of strange people with highly-charged emotions saying and doing odd thought-provoking things in semi-comical ways - if you include violence and swearing you could say that's 90% of modern movies though! The subject of hate = love has been explored better since Gilda, but with me the first cut is always the deepest - I first saw this when I was a more impressionable youngster. What we have is a scintillating four way love/hate relationship between Ballin, Johnny, Ballin & Johnny's little friend with no name, & Gilda that ultimately becomes the "usual" tawdry tangle, resolved by their nightclub's toilet-attendant. Huh? When you're in the middle of this fantasy world you can swallow all of this and more.

Probably the second best B picture ever made it only starts to feel like one during the last 30 minutes down to the metaphorical walking into the sunset ending. There's so many good bits: The inventive and relentlessly snappy dialogue between the main characters throughout the film; Johnny quoting statistically that there are more insects in the world than women; Johnny waking up at 5am to the sound of Gilda singing to Pio the toilet-attendant; Pio's reaction after the midget industrialist killed himself in the toilets; Ballin describing his little friend's attributes to Johnny who claims he's just as good; Ballin asking Gilda if she was decent when she was; Johnny telling Ballin categorically that he taught Gilda ALL she knew; Gilda's little striptease - what creeps there were in that club - and fancy stopping her!

Not quite as good as, but a worthy bookend for Casablanca, THE best B picture ever made.

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32 out of 39 people found the following comment useful :-
Rita Hayworth Was THE Movie Star of the 1940's..., 15 April 1999

Author: Donald J. Lamb from Philadelphia, PA

You could not have come up with a better title for this seductive thriller. GILDA is what this film is all about and Rita Hayworth is so engrossing and beautiful, you sometimes forget what is going on and just stare. "Put the Blame on Mame" is one of film history's more memorable singing sequences and we get to see it twice. Look out for the famous "hair-toss" scene the prisoners in SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION cheer at. There is a film to talk about here but the alluring Ms. Hayworth is always on the tip of your tongue.

Glenn Ford is the anti-hero of this excellent Noir portrait of double-crosses, jealousy, and forbidden love. He has many flaws, not the least being his infatuation of Gilda. Director Charles Vidor looked as though he was trying to capture a CASABLANCA-esque feel with the casino in Buenos Aires and people of all walks of life toiling within. There are even some familiar head nods at a roulette table. This is no CASABLANCA, but the end of WWII is somewhere in the backdrop and the stoic "Ballin Mundson", played by George Macready (PATHS OF GLORY), seems to have some foreign matters happening on the side, like "Victor Lazlo". The crisp black and white cinematography is effective, especially in the casino where 2/3 of the film takes place.

GILDA is all Hayworth and, whether you are a male or female viewer, you see a good performance. She is great to look at, but her dramatic scenes are equally great to see. GILDA is an all-time classic that ranks with MALTESE FALCON and DOUBLE INDEMNITY. Throughout the picture, the blame is put on Rita for most of the plot's turning points. There may just be someone as sweet as her flowing red hair inside waiting to come out. Glenn Fords' Johnny Farrel (perfect name for Noir character) cannot look past her deceiving flirtation and realize that the bad guy is right in front of him. Another triumphant film of the 1940's that works every time, GILDA is Rita Hayworth's claim to fame and sent her into the stratosphere as a star. She was more than just a pin-up.

RATING: 9 of 10

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25 out of 28 people found the following comment useful :-
A fusion of sexual heat, jealousy, fear and hatred - terrific stuff!, 25 January 2005
Author: stephen-357 from United States

Johnny is a small time, but talented, hustler who finds himself at the wrong end of a gun on the dark back streets of Buenos Aires. He is rescued by a mysterious and controlling stranger, Ballin Mundson, who ends up being the owner of a club/casino that operates under the radar of the law. Johnny and Ballin form a close partnership with Johnny being the "man who runs the joint" and Ballin the Master. When Ballin takes a short leave and comes back married to the gorgeous Gilda, a threesome develops that puts a strain on the partnership. There is a burning mutual dislike between Johnny and Gilda. When Gilda feigns ignorance over not remembering his name, she coyly replies, "Johnny. So hard to remember . . . and so easy to forget." Of course there's much more to their acquaintance than they are willing to acknowledge, and a fusion of sexual heat, jealousy, fear and hatred keep the tension tightly wound which fuels the film. And of course there is Rita Hayworth up front and center. All the accolades that have been showered on her sexy "striptease" interpretation of "Put the Blame on Mame" are true! And still this film has much more to offer; an economical but effective story line; a tight witty script loaded with innuendo; and superb acting all around, especially the overlooked icy performance of George Macready as Ballin Mundson.

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14 out of 15 people found the following comment useful :-
The Great Tungsten Cartel Caper, 16 March 2005

Author: theowinthrop from United States

George Macready is playing the role that most people remember him for - Balin Munson, nightclub millionaire in Argentina, and a man with pure ice in his veins. He has two friends...Johnny (Glenn Ford), who Balin rescues from some toughs, and a slick, sharp little chum hidden in his walking stick - ever ready to cut up people that Balin doesn't like. He also has bigger plans. Men like Balin are not satisfied with successful nightclub/gambling casinos (however successfully they are run). During the Second World War several German and axis industrialists found Balin a comfortable man to do business with. It seems they were not sure if Der Fuhrer would win after all, so they transferred various papers concerning their international holdings in tungsten manufacturing to Balin for him to watch. Big mistake, for Balin realizes that the documents actually put these interests into his fully capable hands. And since he has managed to bribe a local tungsten manufacturer to sell out his plant in Argentina, if Balin can leave without police interference he can put together a cartel that will control the manufacture of such things as light bulb filaments. Sounds preposterous, but that is Balin's goal. He only has two problems: Johnny and Balin's beautiful wife Gilda (Rita Hayworth) apparently know each other and can't stand each other - but he has to leave them in charge of his nightclub while he's away. The other problem is Detective Maurice Obregon (Joseph Calleia) of the Argentine Police Department. Obregon suspects Balin's involvement in this illegal cartel scheme, and is watching him like a hawk.

"Gilda" is the film that made Rita Hayworth a star, and (with "Paths of Glory") gave Macready his justifiable claims to being one of Hollywood's best villains. Ironically many people don't think of Macready as anything but a villain in movies. It is true that in films like "Lady Without a Passport" and "The Big Clock" he was a villain, but he also could play decent people. He tries to help Spencer Tracy escape recapture and execution in "The Seventh Cross", and he is the wise minister and reformer who helps thwart Ray Milland (a.k.a. the Devil) in "Alias Nick Beal". But his Balin is pure, malevolent ice. There has been some suggestion that Balin's relationship with Johnny is actually a homosexual one (the business with the knife in the cane possibly being a metaphor for a male sex organ). Perhaps, but it is a weird friendship of two cynics who (briefly) enjoy each other's cynicism.

Curiously enough the business of the tungsten cartel is rarely discussed in going over the film. Like "Notorious" which came out about the same time, "Gilda" reminded American audiences of the large numbers of Nazis and collaborators who fled to South America in this period. In "Notorious" it was Brazil, and the gang (led by Alex Sebastian - Claude Rains) was fooling around with uranium. Here the idea of such people controlling a useful metal's manufacturing was not probed as much, probably because Balin was set to double cross them. But it is worrying to think of them coming so close to it.

In a discussion of the Warner Baxter film, "Such Men Are Dangerous" I mentioned that (like that film) there is a hint here of the 1928 mysterious death of millionaire Alfred Loewenstein, who managed to fall out of his private airplane over the English Channel. Here, to evade both the Nazis and Calleia, Balin arranges his plane to explode over the ocean (although the audience and Calleia see a figure parachute before it does so). Not quite the same problem as the Loewenstein mystery, but one can see the seed of the idea was there.

I would say this was certainly one of the better film noirs. It even was somewhat thought provoking.

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14 out of 16 people found the following comment useful :-
Put the blame on Mame, 7 May 2006

Author: jotix100 from New York

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

Johnny Farrell, a New York gambler, is seen as the opening of the film playing on the waterfront in Buenos Aires with some shady characters. He is a lucky man who makes the mistake of stopping to count his money, something that if he had listened to that song, "The Gambler", he never would have done. When someone appears with a gun to mug him, he is saved by the eerily handsome Ballin Mundson, a man who sees possibilities in the younger man.

Johnny, who has been invited to visit Mundson's casino, pays a visit and again, he is lucky playing blackjack, but the boss suspects the gambler is cheating. After calling him to the office, Mundson agrees to employ Johnny, who will be working for him in protecting his interests. Johnny notices a few odd things that don't sit well with him. When he questions Mundson about it, the explanation doesn't satisfy him, but he plays along. It has been hinted about a homosexual context between Mundson and Johnny. Mundson gives the impression that he likes Johnny a bit too much and Johnny, in appearing grateful for his employment at the casino, also rises the question about an under current between them.

When Mundson returns with a new wife, surprising Johnny, it turns out he had known, and perhaps loved, Gilda in New York. Gilda has a mean disposition toward Johnny and does everything possible to get him in trouble. Their repartee gives the film an edge because it's clear that whatever they had is still going on. Gilda wants to have fun at whatever expense, but Johnny is always a step ahead of her in foiling whatever attempts she makes with every new man to enjoy herself.

After a tragic air accident where Mundson dies, Gilda marries Johnny, but they grow apart. She flees to Montevideo where she embarks in a career as a singer and dancer. We see her doing two numbers that are show stoppers, "Amado Mio", and "Put the Blame on Mame". She is tricked back to Buenos Aires where Johnny is awaiting for her, but fate has it that the Buenos Aires experience has been bad for both of them and the next best thing is to go back home, as a couple.

Charles Vidor directed with sure hand a story that, at times, doesn't make much sense. The story was adapted for the screen by Jo Eisinger. The plot, also, reminds us about "Casablanca" in that both Johnny and Gilda are in a foreign land far from their native turf and are at the mercy of a man who is rich and powerful to make them pay for their betrayal. Supposedly, Humphrey Bogart was the choice for playing Johnny, but it would have been a different film altogether than the one that Charles Vidor made.

Rita Hayworth is billed over the title. She was at the height of her career in Hollywood. She was a beautiful woman with such magnetism to get any man's attention by just being there. Ms. Hayworth is helped enormously by Jean Louis' wardrobe. Especially effective the gown she wears to sing "Put the Blame on Mame". That number will remain the hallmark of her work. Glenn Ford, on the other hand, is a bit unsure in some key moments, especially during the masked ball. George McCready is perfect as the villainous Ballin Mundson. Steven Geray also makes a valuable contribution as the bathroom attendant who calls Johnny a peasant.

The copy of "Gilda" we watched on TCM recently has been lovingly restored to a crisp black and white originally shot by Rudolph Mate, its cinematographer. Doris Fisher's songs are perfect and serve as a delightful distraction for showing a playful Rita Hayworth doing justice to both numbers. King Vidor's direction elevated the film to a higher status. This movie, even sixty years later, still has a great look and it's a joy to watch after a few prior viewings.

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12 out of 13 people found the following comment useful :-
Red Hot Rita in Complex Film Noir Gem, 29 April 2006

Author: dglink from Alexandria, VA

Rita Hayworth positively sizzles as Gilda in this film-noir classic. From her initial hair-tossing scene to her near striptease while she sings "Put the Blame on Mame," Hayworth is captivating and more than convincing as the object of every man's desires. However, beyond the overtly heterosexual lures of Ms. Hayworth lurks a complex and ambiguous romantic triangle that provides more intrigue than the surface plot, which involves a gambling casino that is a front for shady operations that originated in a recently defeated, Fascist country.

Hayworth may either be the intruding wedge that comes between Glenn Ford and George Macready or the object of both men's romantic interests. From the initial meeting between Ford as two-bit gambler Johnny Farrell and Macready as Ballin Mundson the casino owner, an ambiguous, possibly homo-erotic, attraction is established between the two men. The lingering looks that they exchange can be read in several ways, but Bogie never looked into Cagney's eyes like Ford looks into Macready's. After Ford begins to work for Macready, his devoted care and slavish attention to his boss's needs exceed the bounds of employee and employer. When Hayworth moves into Macready's home as his new wife, Ford returns the key to the house as though he were a jilted lover. Ford's increasing jealousy becomes apparent after Hayworth's arrival on the scene, but it is unclear of whom he is jealous, Hayworth or Macready or possibly both. Perhaps Ford's character is as unsure of his own feelings as is the viewer, which makes the ambiguity even more intriguing. Macready's jealousy also grows as the heat between Ford and Hayworth intensifies, but, again, it is ambiguous of whom he is jealous.

With a dazzling performance by Hayworth, excellent black-and-white photography by Rudoph Mate, fine direction by Charles Vidor, and layers of psychological possibilities to ponder, "Gilda" is as golden as its title suggests.

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14 out of 18 people found the following comment useful :-
Steaming Up the Argentine, 27 August 2006

Author: bkoganbing from Buffalo, New York

Glenn Ford and Rita Hayworth made five films together, but when they are talked of as a screen team, it's only Gilda that people are really talking about. Their first film was before World War II, The Lady in Question where both are young Columbia contract players who were in the same film and no effort was made to bill them as a team. The Loves of Carmen which was made after Gilda was a disaster for Glenn Ford, though Rita was at her sexiest. Affair in Trinidad was a good effort to recapture the magic of Gilda after Rita's storm marriage to Aly Khan and the last film The Money Trap was a Glenn Ford film where Rita has a brief role as an old girl friend. She was the best thing in that film by far.

Do you remember in Cabaret how both the Liza Minnelli and Michael York characters find out they are sex partners to the same German bi-sexual man? That's essentially what happens in Gilda though with the Code firmly in place it's not something we talk about. George MacReady, a man of many interests rescues Glenn Ford from the docks of Buenos Aires after he's won some money from sailors in a crap game. They hit it off and Ford becomes his right hand man in running the casino MacReady operates.

Then MacReady brings home a wife and lo and behold it turns out to be an old girl friend of Ford's, Rita Hayworth. Add to that some Nazi refugees have some business with MacReady over some tungsten mines.

The real emphasis in this film is sex and personified by the best embodiment of sex ever on the silver screen. This film raked in a lot of dollars for Harry Cohn and Columbia Pictures. Hayworth, voice dubbed as usual, had a big number here in Put the Blame on Mame. It became a signature tune for her the rest of her life.

One thing did disappoint me about Gilda. For a story that took place in Buenos Aires who many say is the most beautiful city in the world, it would have been nice to see some location shots, even if it was just some newsreels to establish the time and place. The film might as well have been in Albuquerque.

But when you've got Rita to look at, it could be at the South Pole.

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9 out of 10 people found the following comment useful :-
'Got me on my knees, Gilda', 21 April 2006

Author: Jem Odewahn from Australia

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

One of my absolute favourite films ever, 'Gilda' is scorchingly hot. That description can be applied to the title character played by the divine Rita Hayworth, who turns in a great acting performance. Her chemistry and love-hate relationship with Glenn Ford is at the centrepiece of this multilayered, entertaining film-noir.

Ford's drifter character Johnny Farrell provides the voice-over to the film, and it is through his eyes that we view the action. Johnny is a gambler by trade, but down on his luck at the moment. The crippled Buenos Aires casino owner Ballin Mundson (George Macready)saves Johnny's life in a dark alleyway with his ever-present cane that hides a lethal dagger ('a most faithful, obedient friend'). The homosexual subtext of Gilda is introduced in Jonny's first fateful encounter with Mundson. The sexual tension between the two is obvious, as Johnny talks his way into being hired at Ballin's casino. He rises through the ranks quickly and becomes Mundson's right-hand man and confidante. Life is happy for the 'three of them' (the third friend being the ever-present cane)until Ballin takes a business trip and comes back with a wife. Gilda.

We first meet Gilda in Ballin's bedroom suite. The strains of 'Put The Blame On Mame' are heard on the phonograph, as Hayworth makes one of the most memorable entrances in film history. The seductive, flirtatious yet ultimately lovable Gilda is a figure from Johnny's past that he is trying desperately to forget. Their connection and attraction is revealed later in the film.

Boy, do Hayworth and Ford turn the heat up in this film! The love-hate relationship between Gilda and Johnny is a flame-filled fiasco, heightened by Johnny's loyalty to his boss and Gilda's husband Mundson. Gilda's antics with other men are all show to make Johnny jealous, but the 'cock-eyed' Farrell can only see that Gilda may hurt Ballin (the homosexual element is again paramount here) so his solution is to hurt her. Mundson is secretly involved in a complicated tungsten plot, and he fakes his own suicide half-way through the film. Johnny marries Gilda to punish her for her assumed betrayals of Mundson, and puts this glittering, bejewelled exotic bird in a cage.

Gilda loves Johnny, yet he is an unresponsive husband filled with jealous rage towards his free-willed, sexually uninhibited wife. The misogynistic element of the film is pronounced in Johnny's treatment of Gilda and women in general. Gilda tires of her trapped situation soon enough and rebels by taking out various men. Again, it's just show but Johnny doesn't know that and is too stubborn to care. Instead he hires a man to keep Gilda on a leash. She breaks free and runs off to Montevideo and starts divorce proceedings, meeting a new man who happens to be another one of Johnny's 'hired help'. In one of the cruelest acts possible, Gilda is tricked into going back to Buenos Aires and back to Johnny. Hayworth's screams and cries to Johnny to 'let her go' are fruitless and she reacts the only way she knows how. She sings THAT song in THAT dress. 'Put The Blame On Mame'.

It's the most memorable scene from the film, and Gilda's cry for help and/or sympathy is highlighted in the lyrics of 'Mame', about a woman who is often unfairly blamed by men. Gilda's life story, so it seems. The bawdy, sexual striptease (not really a striptease, as Rita only removes her long black gloves!) provoked outrage from the censors in the 40's, and it provokes outrage from Ford, too. It is the only way Gilda can react, and she wants to publicly embarrass and shame Johnny. It is too late for Johnny to realise how blind he has been and for Gilda to clean up her act for this obsessed pair to be together? Wait and see.

Rita's sultry performance is often remarked upon because of THAT song and her stunning looks. However, her acting is excellent in this film. She definitely deserved an Oscar nomination (Why oh why did she not get one?)for her role, along with Ford. The heat these two generate is awesome in it's power, and the love scenes are strikingly modern in contrast to many contemporary films. These two adored each other in real-life, so it must have been hard for them both when the script called for Rita to hit Glenn and vice versa. Rita was nothing like Gilda in real-life, she was a very shy, unassuming woman so it is testament to Rita's talent as an actress that she could create such a character as Gilda. Gilda is seductive yet sympathetic; women should really hate her, but can we really blame this girl who is so unfairly treated by men? For these reasons, I believe Gilda is NOT a femme fatale.

Macready is very, very good as the crippled villain this noir has to have. He has a creepy presence, adding to the dark atmosphere of 'Gilda'. The whole film is foreboding, tense and thrilling! The final 10 minutes had me chewing my fingernails with expectation. Most of all, you'll remember Hayworth and Ford and that juicy dialogue:

Gilda: Didn't you hear about me, Gabe? If I'd been a ranch, they would've named me the Bar Nothing.

Gilda: do hate me, don't you, Johnny? Johnny: I don't think you have any idea how much. Gilda: Hate is a very exciting emotion. Haven't you noticed? Very exciting. I hate you too, Johnny. I hate you so much, I think I'm gonna die from it. Darling. I think I'm gonna die from it.

10/10.

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