MovieChat Forums > Lady of the Tropics (1939) Discussion > re: Lady of the Tropics

re: Lady of the Tropics

posted 10 years ago by geoffzman04
6 replies | jump to latest

Hedy is lovely, the cinematography gorgeous but simply not enough to overcome an uncharacteristic poor script by Hecht. Difficult to watch and digest as the plot unfolds. All the cliches, melodramatic dialogue and cultural missteps make it seem disingenuous. Worth watching for Hedy is simply stunning and does her best to keep the morality tale afloat but the plot meanders, Taylor's wooden performance and dialogue seem over the top, add poor direction/writing and it all conspires to sink momentum and rob the sentimental finale the power it deserves.

[–] BelleCBelle 9 years ago

Ah well. As gorgeous as Taylor was, he was usually a very stiff actor, in my opinion.

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[–] bnwfilmbuff 8 years ago

Hedy is very beautiful in this especially in the final scene. Her acting was also very good (generally underrated imo). Taylor's character's behavior at the end is a bit inexplicable and the ending is weak in an otherwise pretty good movie.

[–] Satantangoandcash 8 years ago

I agree. I watched this to see Hedy, and I was not disappointed, though I could never accept the premise that her heritage was French and Vietnamese. But I'm glad that they did not try to bad make-up on her as they did on Delaroch. The cinematography was very good, and the plot was weak but I wonder if the cultural missteps which are so obvious today went unnoticed in 1939. American audiences today have a poor understanding of Asian countries and cultures and they would have been even more ignorant in 1939.

[–] Popcorngal (4345) a year ago

Number one, I never considered Vietnam a tropical country, despite the climate, when I think of tropics, I picture the South Pacific or the Carribbean. Overall, an interesting film. Are they really speaking Vietnamese? I live near a Vietnamese- American neighborhood, but it sounds different. You are correct, Americans in that era did have limited knowledge of Southeastern Asian nations.

[–] Otter (24464) a year ago

Vietnam is very close to the equator and I understand it has lots of rain forest, so it's probably got a tropical climate in scientific terms. But for some reason, Americans vaguely believe that "tropical" means islands, or Florida.

Anyway! I think very few Americans knew that Vietnam (a.k.a. Indochina) existed before the Vietnam War, and the only Vietnamese person of note I've ever heard of was actress France Nguyen, who appeared in an episode of "Star Trek" and a "Planet of the Apes" movie. And now I find out that she was actually born in Marseilles, thank you Google.

[–] Popcorngal (4345) a year ago

I didn't know Delaroach was suppose to be Eurasian. I thought he was just a rich French guy.