Alfred Hitchcock, “Rich and Strange” aka “East of Shanghai” (1931)
One of a group of films Hitchcock made in his lean early-1930’s period – the others include ‘Number 17″, “Juno and the Paycock” and “Waltzes from Vienna” – when he was under contractual obligations which forced him to make films with skimpy budgets, less-than-willing actors and uninteresting subject matter, this romantic comedy can be construed as a morality tale of how sudden wealth can test and undermine a couple’s loyalties on one level and as a satire on British insular middle class values and aspirations. White-collar wage slave Fred (Henry Kendall), after yet another stressful journey home from work, is fed up with his bank clerk job routine and wishes for a long holiday. He and his wife Emily (Joan Barry) – they have been married for eight years but have no children – receive a huge inheritance from his rich uncle and they decide to use the money to go on a cruise to east Asia. Initially excited about the change to their routine, Fred and Emily rapidly discover the disaster awaiting both of them: Fred gets seasick and has to stay in bed all day, leaving his wife prey to the attentions of a worldly cruise passenger, Commander Gordon (Percy Marmont), whom she falls in love with. On a rare occasion when Fred ventures out onto deck he bumps into a woman (Betty Amann) posing as a princess and falls heavily for her charms. Fred and Emily’s marriage becomes strained to the point where they seriously consider divorcing each other. Unsurprisingly the “princess” steals all the couple’s money and disappears when the ship docks at Singapore and Fred and Emily must return to Britain in whatever way they can.
Flitting from a slapstick opening scene that harks back to the silent era of films to lightweight farce (often centred on the pathetic foibles of a dowdy single woman [Elsie Randolph] desperate to find shipboard romance but continually being rebuffed) to satire, soapie romance melodrama, dark comedy and almost-suspenseful disaster film, “Rich and Strange” defies easy genre categorisation. In the 1930’s the mix of genre elements in the film contributed to its sinking at the box office but in the present day such a mix might gain the film art-house status as a post-modern movie. How public attitudes do change. The theme of two individuals being outside their usual comfort zone to be tested by different people and circumstances extends to the making of the film itself: much of the film lacks dialogue and title cards are used in typical silent-movie style to indicate change in location as the cruise-liner powers on or a change in plot. For most of its running time the movie bounces between Emily and her charming though subtly creepy lover, discreetly conducting their affair at night and in places away from inquisitive eyes, and Fred and his vampy “princess” who are all over each other in comic ways; the pace can be slow and there’s no sense of the strain between Emily and Freddy that must surely be building up to the inevitable outburst when they arrive in Singapore. Action starts to speed up once the couple board a cargo ship which meets with disaster at sea but even here with danger present, tension is missing with Fred and Emily taking the ship’s sinking and their rescue by a pirate crew in their stride.
The acting is a strange mix: Kendall often over-acts and Barry has a more subtle, natural style. This is deliberate to show the contrast between their characters: both are naive and completely out of their depth in their new surrounds but Emily has more brain and self-awareness and Fred is a complete klutz. Marmont portrays the charming and sensitive naval man well, eventually revealing a conniving and ultimately demanding and inconsiderate nature, but his motivation for trailing Emily is unclear; by contrast Amann’s vampy scam artist is no more than a stock character with the occasional insightful remark. Character development is uneven: one of the couple is definitely made older and wiser but the other appears not to have learned much so whether the marriage will survive now that they’re back in familiar territory is another question.
Technically the film is accomplished with location filming done in some places and Fred’s seasickness simulated in scenes that go up and down drunkenly, blur or have print leaping out of a dinner menu. The secretive nature of Emily’s flirtation is highlighted in an almost fetishistic panning shot of her legs swathed in a gown stepping over chains and ropes and their shadows as she walks along the ship’s deck, followed by Gordon, at night. The couple’s stupefaction at the attractions of Paris is captured in an excited montage of Paris scenes intercut with a shot of their faces with glazed eyes mechanically looking from left to right. In an age before the Second World War when British military commanders derided the capabilities of Japan’s armed forces and were made to look foolish when that country captured Singapore in 1942, Hitchcock’s portrayal of Asians is sympathetic and even uses Fred and Emily’s interactions with the Chinese pirate crew to send up the couple’s ignorance and prejudices and to indulge in some black humour. Are they really eating cat stew or is it just coincidence that the pirate pinned up the cat-skin on the cabin wall just as they’re hoeing into their breakfast? On the other hand the pirates don’t say anything or do very much – they look on impassively as one of their number accidentally drowns – suggesting perhaps the film’s budget left no room for an interpreter.
In spite of the film’s uneven plot in which the middle part is very drawn out and the end is rushed – the pirate crew appears to deliver the couple safely to their destination and they presumably get help from the nearest British consulate to get home – the two main characters, especially Emily, have enough appeal as ordinary people with all their faults and lack of knowledge or interest about the world around them that set them up for the Holiday from Hell for viewers to identify with them and follow their adventures. There’s actually potential within the plot for Hitchcock to insert some of his beloved obsessions to reinforce the theme of deception – Commander Gordon could have sinister designs on Emily for all we know, Fred could foil the naval man’s plot to off her by sheer accident or idiocy and the couple, once they work out they’re both being hoodwinked, realise they need each other after all – so why he didn’t do so remains a mystery. Of Hitchcock’s early films, this one represents a lost opportunity for Hitchcock to make in the mould of films he was accustomed to. It’s a well-made film with some fine acting that could do with a more finely tuned plot and some of Hitchcock’s favourite themes and motifs.