SHANGHAI (1935)

After testing the local waters in a few small roles (e.g. RED-HEADED WOMAN/’32), Charles Boyer finally took the Hollywood plunge in 1935, co-starring against Claudette Colbert, Katharine Hepburn & here Loretta Young in his third & least film of the year.  Thin romantic gruel from journeyman megger James Flood about star-crossed lovers, it’s loaded with noble renunciation scenes (one sees them both going at it), after Boyer’s penniless Russian exile reinvents himself as Shanghai’s most successful society investment banker and starts handling Young’s assets . . . so to speak.  But an insurmountable obstacle could dash all expectations, if not without a fight by the dogged Ms. Young to follow her man, even into uncharted territories, accompanied by her rich Aunt’s housemaid & mink.  Even with Boyer’s accent still thick as Grandpère’s Sunday mayonnaise, there’s glamorous chemistry between the leads and a surprising social obstacle for the lovers to overcome.  Without giving it away, let’s just say that intimations of MLK Jr.’s famous ‘I Have A Dream’ speech are the last thing you expect to hear in this sort of thing.  Yet, here it is; three decades before the fact.  Ending the film with what could pass as a first draft of those famous final cadences at the Washington Mall 1963.

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: Look for a nice turn from little known Fred Keating as Young’s hard-drinking/hard-smoking asexual pal.  Sounding, looking & with the mannerisms of Lowell Sherman who specialized in these roles before his premature death the previous year.

DOUBLE-BILL/LINK: Right before helping Boyer find his Hollywood form, director Flood helped Cary Grant become ‘Cary Grant’ in the effective aviation soaper WINGS IN THE DARK/’35 against Myrna Loy.  https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2008/10/wings-in-dark-1935.html