Teardrop... The Flame of Love (1930)/ Dangerous to Know (1938), BFI Anna May Wong: The Art of Reinvention

And as another tear falls with definitive purpose as Anna May Wong shows herself at 33 years of age as a master of her emotional craft. Dangerous to Know is a surprisingly powerful film with mature sound technique and a very strong line-up including the indomitable Akim Tamiroff, Gail Patrick, Lloyd Nolan and young Anthony Quinn. Anna not only holds her own but raises her game to provide the film’s heart, soul and surprising ending. As with so much of her work, she acts between the lines to hand over more thought and expression than her script might define. Season curator Xin Peng said that she had not seen the film before planning out the programme and it was not only one of her favourites now but perhaps her subject’s best film. This season has been a revelation for this and much more.

 

I have questions about the AMW brand in 1930...

 

Hai-Tang aka The Flame of Love (1930), 35mm BFI print

 

She: How long I wonder Boris, will we two be together, just as we are now…?

He: Always Hai-Tang, surely it will always be so.

She: No Boris, the day will come when you and I will go another way, it must be so…

He: Hai-Tang my dear… I’m not going to listen to you. [Plays Beautiful Songs of Russia on the piano]

She [impressed]: You are right Boris, why think of tomorrow?

 

First up was a continuation of Anna May’s European adventure with her first major talkie, Hai-Tang aka the above title – the third film she had made with Richard Eichberg after Song (1928) and Pavement Butterfly (1929). It was co-directed with Walter Summers, who co-wrote the English-language script, and filmed at Elstree Studios by British International Pictures - another “euro-pudding” with continental ingredients all complicated by the need to accommodate spoken languages, in this case three, German and French as well as English as it ought to be spoken courtesy of Miss Wong’s extraordinary facility with language and dialect.

 

After the critical bashing she got for her American twang performing Circle of Chalk on the London stage, AMW invested two hundred guineas in a voice coach according to Xin Peng and her hard work paid off in this English version when, if anything she comes across as more fluent than her co-star John Longden who is a bit too sonorous and microphone aware at times (I know, in spite of the silent/talkie Blackmail…). The actress was equally diligent learning German six hours a day initially for Song (1928) – working harder than she ever did on childhood Chinese lessons in Los Angeles noted Professor Peng who quoted a German review noting that many of their countrymen could do with applying themselves as she had.

 

Anna plays Hai-Tang the star of a Chinese troupe of acrobats, and of a show including singers and dancers many of whom we get to see perform at a theatre mocked up on the giant Elstree sound stage. The setting is pre-revolutionary Russia with Longden playing Lieutenant Boris Borissoff, Adjutant to the Grand Duke whose troops are based in St Petersburg.

 

Variety dismissed the film as “just a programmer”, noting the “poor direction” and dialogue although it appears they were reviewing the French version which has Marcel Vibert as the Grand Duke whereas the English one has German actor Georg H. Schnell who is suitably imposing and brutal when he needs to be. The film is reasonably unconcerned with the issues of race except for “the Grand-Duke’s lady”, dance hall hostess Yvette (played in English and French by the Mexican Mona Goya who makes a good show of a French accent) who warns Boris to think of his career when it comes to his choice of romantic partner.

 

Orders? What are they to me? I tell you I will not go… we must fly… I would sooner die.

John Longden and Anna

As with all of these films though, AMW is an object of desire even if it is forbidden in some way – and not just by the coy British censors’ consideration of which prevents Mr Longden from connecting his lips with those of Ms Wong at any point no matter how much they declare their love. Forbidden love rarely is allowed to be consummated although, for the purposes of the plot, it’s fine to let the Grand Duke lust after Hai-Tang and he forces her to come to the Orpheum café a down-market venue hosting coarser entertainments and notorious venue in which the Grand Duke’s men do as they wilt.

 

So it is that the Grand Duke tries to take advantage of Hai-Tang with Boris hidebound by his rank and duty, exactly as she knew would happen but she agrees to go for the sake of his career. Who will stand up for her when the time comes?

 

The story is slight but AMW acts well and there is excellent support from Fred Schwartz (credited as Schwarz) as Birnbaum, the long-suffering and wise-cracking Jewish piano player: a relative outsider just like Hai-Tang and someone who is brave enough to try and set things straight once events get out of hand. It is also fascinating to see the dancers, jugglers and acrobats, no doubt fresh from the music halls of the west end. Variety, the spice of life!

 

Gail Patrick and Akim Tamiroff

Dangerous to Know (1938), 35mm

 

According to Xin Peng, directly after wrapping the above film, Anna May Wong was offered the role in the New York production of Edgar Wallace's hit 1930 play, On the Spot, with the writer ambushing her on her arrival in New York docks after she had sailed over from Southampton – she signed before she left the Port Authority recognising the opportunity to play a leading role with agency. The producers had finally decided on the novel idea of casting an actor of Chinese descent in the role of a character of Chinese descent and the resulting successful run would allow her to fully develop the character and thereby establish her stage credentials. When casting this film version eight years later, there was only one choice.

 

Wallace's play had been inspired by the career of Al Capone and featured Akim Tamiroff as Stephen Recka a gangster well on the way to establishing himself in straight society and who is always steps ahead of the police, press and politicians. Tamiroff has Edgar G Robinson energy and barely blinks in this film as a man driven by a ferocious need to prove himself, he’s the smartest man in the room and can also play Mozart better than a professional musician on his pipe organ. Yet there are still people who underestimate him and these include his own men, one of whom plots to replace him as the man behind City Hall with his own puppet mayor. Recka finds out and there’s a cold-blooded price exacted.

 

Steve Recka? That kind never gets into our house…

That’s why you must ask him. He’s very anxious to meet nice people and I’m very anxious to get re-elected…

Akim Tamiroff 

The only person to understand this man is his “hostess” Madame Lan Ying (AMW) a woman who provides the greatness underpinning Recka’s legitimate empire someone, no matter how incredibly intelligent he is, the “businessman” is taking for granted as he chases a position in polite society that might just be beyond him. We see this at his birthday party where establishment money gives him only begrudging respect he frightens them; he owns them and they do not like him for it. Yet, he charms them and they laugh at his jokes.

All the charm of a diplomat.

Yes and ten times the general ship.

 

Into this walks Margaret van Case (Gail Patrick) a woman from old money who is curious to meet Steve Recka whose reputation makes him a bit of a thrill for the socialite. Steve is instantly smitten and a flirtation begins much to Lan Ying’s distress, she sees a rival but deeper than that, an over-reach that can only result in trouble. So it proves as Steve tries and fails to woo Margaret and then, realising she loves a young bond salesman Phillip Easton (Harvey Stephens), frames him for robbery in an attempt to force her into marriage.

 

Mexican Anthony Quinn was a long-term friend of Anna's and in many of her films

It's fast-paced and there’s quick-witted support from Lloyd Nolan as Inspector Brandon and Anthony Quinn is good too as Recka’s lieutenant Nicky Kusnoff who along with Lan Ying, see’s Steve making mistakes as he searches for the ultimate negation of his criminal past.

 

The closing section is full of surprises and everything rests on Anna May Wong’s ability to break hearts and to bring her exquisite empathy out from the screen and into the audience. This is a superlative performance and certainly one of her very best. Even battle-hardened old marketing professionals were left shaken and stirred as those tears flowed and fragile courage also came forth. A very important stage in her acting journey!

 

There’s still two weeks to go of this season, details on the BFI website.

The 3D comic… After the Fox (1966), BFI Blu-ray coming soon!

“Because I’m a small crook I have to go to prison, it’s only the big crooks that stay free…”

 

There is an enduring fascination with the notion of Peter Sellers being an empty vessel who was only inhabited by the roles he played and the suspicion that this even extended to his private life. No doubt he was highly adept at mimicry and took this to the screen with such convincing “method” that you could barely see the “real me” at all. As Vic Pratt says in his excellent video essay accompanying this new release, this was a myth Sellers was happy to promote, telling The Daily Mail in 1960 that “I haven't a personality. I sometimes wonder whether I really exist at all.”

 

In After the Fox, Sellers plays, Aldo Vanucci, aka The Fox, an Italian criminal who is a master of disguise OR… is he Peter Sellers, playing Peter Sellers as an Italian master of disguise? It’s hard to tell but there’s a likability and knowing good humour about each sub-role, from Aldo playing a priest angry at his sister’s becoming an actor, or as the doctor who, get this, impersonates himself to escape prison (maybe). Pride of place has to go to Aldo’s impersonation of Federico Fabrizi, a film director using the pretence of making a film to smuggle stolen gold into Italy.

 

There’s so many layers in Neil Simon’s onion of a plot and so many knowing pot shots at Italian cinema from the deliberate “FF” to lines like “What’s neorealism?”, “No money…” which is pretty funny when you consider this film’s director, Vittorio De Sica famously directed Bicycle Thieves. Michel Antonioni is also high up on the list of targets with this FF making a film up on the spot and deciding that his two leads sitting and doing nothing would make a statement on our inability to communicate in modern society… “Lights, camera and no action!” indeed.

Victor Mature and Britt Ekland make a statement 

There’s also a scene when Victor Mature’s fading Hollywood leading man, Tony Powell, arrives to a mob reception in Rome, which reminiscent of Antonioni’s movie star in L’Avventura and probably makes the same point: the public aren’t interested in the who just the what. Mature came out of retirement to make his first film in four years and he’s excellent value for money; perhaps he fancied a laugh and an all-expenses trip to Europe, but his screen presence and willingness to send himself up is in full-blooded contrast to Sellers’ artifice. Same ends, different means.

 

Of course, Sellers is also playing Sellers as the brother of his sister who is his wife… with Britt Ekland staring in her first film as Gina Vanucci  who becomes Gina Romantica when The Fox decides on his plan to film his crime and hide his crime as a film. Aldo is getting tired of the criminal life and wants to look after his mother and sister, “I want to steal enough to go straight!”, another zinger from Simon that still holds true to this day.

 

The gold was stolen in Egypt by master criminal Okra (Akim Tamiroff) who uses his sister (Maria Grazia Buccella) to strip down to a bikini in order to distract the armoured car drivers, who veer off straight into the back of lorry. My daughter rolled her eyes but Okra’s sister is further reduced by merely being his spokeswoman and she mouths his words in the restaurant in which Aldo is briefed.

 

Years before Sara Cooper, Maria Grazia Buccella was an evil man's mouthpiece

She later says to Aldo that Okra “…doesn’t allow me to talk to anyone, I haven’t used a telephone in six years…” which is more of a punchline than a proto-feminist comment. Never-the-less, she has beautiful eyes and plays her part in adding emotional depth as well as humour especially in a world in which, as Aldo says only the big crooks, like her brother and no doubt many film producers, stay free. Simon’s script is most certainly not without intent.

Aldo and his gang of three stooges, Polio (Paolo Stoppa), Siepi (Tino Buazzelli) and Carlo (Mac Ronay) steal filming equipment from Vittorio De Sica (as himself) and he then transforms into Federico Fabrizi in order to persuade Tony Powell to accept the leading “role”, in spite of the objections of his agent Harry Granoff (the ever excellent Martin Balsam) who was looking for an actual script and contract.

 

Crew and cast, now completed by the newly christened Miss Romantica, head off to the seaside village of Sevalio, actually  Sant' Angelo on Ischia in the Bay of Naples, for the film’s impressive set pieces as hundreds of villagers act as extras in action Fabrizi makes up on the hoof. Here there is little sign of any of the reported tensions between Sellers and De Sica, as the latter marshals his extras well to energise the dénouement.

 

De Sica makes like DeMille

The film had a mixed reception on release and Simon for one was critical of how his script turned out but it is well made and still very funny, good performances all round and impressive comedy chops from Ekland as well as Mature. But it’s Sellers’ film and for a man who wasn’t really there, he always manages to convince us enough to care and to believe in Aldo’s misguided by sincere code of honour.

 

The film is bookended by a groovy Bacharach and David theme song which, melodically powerful as it is, also as Vic Pratt says, sums up the unsettling aspects of Sellers’ persona, The Hollies in close harmony asking Sellers in character “who is me”, to which he answers, I am a thief, I am the Fox… and so much more, obscurely.

 

Pratt quotes The Daily Herald review of The Battle of the Sexes (also on BFI Blu-ray!) describing Sellers as “… the first 3D comic, his rivals are all cardboard cut-outs, if you round the back of them, you’d find nothing.”  In this film we can Sellers disappear into character just as he would do all the way through to Chance the Gardner; as the most soulful of mimics, he could walk on water.

In addition to Vic’s essay, Peter Sellers: Master of Disguise  (2020, 14 mins), there’s also a nifty interview with Britt Ekland, After the Fox: A Socially Distanced Interview (2020, 15 mins) which contains much good-humoured insight and positivity as she looks forward to returning to the London stage.

 

There’s an East German newsreel, DDR Magazin Nummer 11 (1962, 12 mins) with director Vittorio De Sica paying a visit to Berlin and The Man With the Velvet Voice: Maurice Denham (1961 + 1975, 72 mins) featuring the mellow tones Mr Denham in two rarities from the BFI National Archive: the CFF classic The Last Rhino and BTF film Go As You Please… in Britain

 

And there is a lovely Victorian silent snippet, Robbery (1897, 1 min), possibly the earliest heist comedy? And, you better order your copy quick as, for the Illustrated booklet with new writing by Vic Pratt, Dr. Deborah Allison and Howard Hughes, notes on the extras and full credits, is only available with the first pressing.

 

After the Fox is released on 21^st September and you can pre-order now on the BFI website; you will not regret it!