The Lady from Shanghai (1947)

Writers:

Sherwood King (novel)
Orson Welles (screenplay)

Release Date:

9 June 1948 (USA)

Genre:

Crime | Drama | Film-Noir | Mystery

Tagline:

One who keeps his nature keeps his original nature in the end.

Plot:

Fascinated by gorgeous Mrs. Bannister, seaman Michael O'Hara joins a bizarre yachting cruise, and ends up mired in a complex murder plot.

Plot Keywords:

Wife | Murder For Hire | Faked Death | Sailor | Jury

Cast

Rita Hayworth	...	Elsa Bannister
Orson Welles	...	Michael O'Hara
Everett Sloane	...	Arthur Bannister
Glenn Anders	...	George Grisby
Ted de Corsia	...	Sidney Broome (as Ted De Corsia)
Erskine Sanford	...	Judge
Gus Schilling	...	'Goldie' Goldfish
Carl Frank	...	District Attorney Galloway
Louis Merrill	...	Jake
Evelyn Ellis	...	Bessie (Bannister maid)
Harry Shannon	...	Cab Driver

Also Known As:

Black Irish (USA) (working title)
Take This Woman (USA) (working title)
The Girl from Shanghai (USA) (working title)

Runtime:

87 min | Germany:79 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English | Cantonese

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Recording)

Certification:

Argentina:13 | Australia:PG | Chile:14 | Finland:K-16 | Germany:12 | Sweden:15 | UK:PG | USA:Approved

Filming Locations:

Acapulco Bay, Acapulco, Guerrero, Mexico

Company:

Columbia Pictures Corporation

Trivia:

Errol Flynn's own pet dachshund is seen in the yacht scenes, since it is Flynn's yacht Zaca in the film. Flynn also did all the aerial photography for that film's yacht scenes and is in the film incognito.

Goofs:

Continuity: Rita dives off the cliffs. However, in the following scene as she boards the boat her hair is dry.

Quotes:

Arthur Bannister, Criminal Lawyer: Mike's got a lot of blarney but he knows how to hurt a man when he gets mad.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in The Man with the Golden Gun (1974)

Soundtrack:

Na Baixa do Sapateiro

Michael O'Hara's Femme Fatale

At the point in time that The Lady from Shanghai was being made, the marriage of Orson Welles and Rita Hayworth was disintegrating. The film was as much an effort by Welles to rekindle the old flames as it was to make a classic noir. Not received well at the time, The Lady from Shanghai has gotten more and more critical acclaim as years pass. Gotten better with age so to speak.

Welles is Irish seaman Michael O'Hara who on a fateful night rescues the beautiful Rita Hayworth from three muggers in Central Park. Sparks do fly, but then comes the rub, turns out the lady is married to crippled, but brilliant criminal attorney Everett Sloane. Nevertheless Sloane takes an apparent liking to Welles and hires him to skipper his yacht.

So far this film is starting to sound a lot like Gilda. If Orson had seen Gilda and was not at this point thinking with his male member, he would have skedaddled back to the seaman's hiring hall in Lower Manhattan. Instead he gets himself involved in a lovely web or intrigue and finds himself pegged for two murders and Sloane as his eminent counsel.

Welles for whatever reason decided that his wife would be a blond in this film. Supposedly Harry Cohn hit the roof as Rita was internationally known for her coppery red hair. This may have soured him on the picture as he joined the legion of studio bosses who saw Welles's vision of independent film making a threat to their power.

Stage actor Glenn Anders plays Sloane's partner Grisby who is one slimy dude, he winds up a corpse. The other corpse to be here is Ted DeCorsia, a bottom feeding private detective who tries to go in business for himself.

It's a good noir thriller, showing Rita at her glamorous best even if she was a blond here. The final shoot out in the hall of mirrors is beautifully staged, but I wouldn't recommend seeing it if one is on any controlled substance.