THE SHIP FROM SHANGHAI (1930)

Leo the Lion had yet to acquire a roar in this early M-G-M Talkie (shot ‘29/released ‘30). But in other ways, this film takes chances with the new technology, shooting much of the action out at sea, not on a soundstage; part of what makes this largely inadequate drama more interesting than it has any right to be. Director Charles Brabin was on his way out of the business*, and you’ll see why in many a static two-shot. But here and there: in a well-handled sea squall or a shipboard attack from behind featuring startling camera movement & lens choice, somebody’s paying attention. (Second-unit?) The unsavory tale of class conflict & penny-ante mutiny is set up when five wealthy snobs (Brits & American) decide to ‘yacht’ their way home from Shanghai on a boat where Louis Wolheim’s nasty, insubordinate steward is barely able to be civil toward passengers or crew. Tension comes to a head when a devastating typhoon lets him take over. And from then on, it’s something between THE ADMIRABLE CRICHTON and LORD OF THE FLIES as the boat drifts, provisions wane and tempers flare. Power unhinges him, or reveals character, and soon Wolheim finds he’s open to attack from both his rich ‘betters’ above and a crew of ‘lessers’ below. A delicious idea, but often painful to sit thru with that affected early Talkie style of acting (straight off the proscenium stage) as well as Wolheim’s oddly garbled British accent. Strangely compelling all the same. (Never more so than when Wolheim makes a big, unwanted forward pass at leading lady Kay Johnson.)

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID/DOUBLE-BILL: Wolheim, only 50 when he died the following year, figured out sound acting in his very next film, ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT/’30. But this role is still worth a look as a close approximation of what he must have been like on B’way in Eugene O’Neill’s THE HAIRY APE back in 1922. (Same idea holds for Walter Huston who used his characterization in O’Neill’s DESIRE UNDER THE ELMS in the similarly plotted A HOUSE DIVIDED/’31.)

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: *Charles Brabin was one of three major names whose career never recovered from M-G-M’s aborted first try to shoot BEN-HUR in Rome, along with leading man George Walsh and Hollywood’s most powerful woman, scenarist/producer June Mathis who died (only 40) two years after M-G-M pulled the plug in Italy and brought up Fred Niblo (along with Ramon Novarro as a new Ben-Hur) to start afresh in Hollywood.