''Macao'' is a 1952

black-and-white Black-and-white (B&W or B/W) images combine black and white in a continuous spectrum, producing a range of shades of grey. Media The history of various visual media began with black and white, and as technology improved, altered to color. ...

film noir Film noir (; ) is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and motivations. The 1940s and 1950s are generally regarded as the "classic period" of American ' ...

adventure directed by

Josef von Sternberg Josef von Sternberg (; born Jonas Sternberg; May 29, 1894 – December 22, 1969) was an Austrian-American filmmaker whose career successfully spanned the transition from the silent to the sound era, during which he worked with most of the major ...

and

Nicholas Ray Nicholas Ray (born Raymond Nicholas Kienzle Jr., August 7, 1911 – June 16, 1979) was an American film director, screenwriter, and actor best known for the 1955 film ''Rebel Without a Cause.'' He is appreciated for many narrative features pr ...

and starring Robert Mitchum, Jane Russell,

William Bendix William Bendix (January 14, 1906 – December 14, 1964) was an American film, radio, and television actor, who typically played rough, blue-collar characters. He is best remembered for his role in ''Wake Island'', which earned him an Academy ...

, and Gloria Grahame.

Plot

The movie opens with the murder of

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

Detective Lieutenant Danial Lombardy, his body discovered in

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...

waters. Three strangers arrive on the same ship at the port of

Macao Macau or Macao (; ; ; ), officially the Macao Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (MSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China in the western Pearl River Delta by the South China Sea. With a pop ...

, 30 miles off colonial Hong Kong: Nick Cochran, a cynical, but honest ex-serviceman, Julie Benton, an equally cynical, sultry, and well-traveled night club singer, and Lawrence Trumble, a jovial traveling salesman who deals in coconut oil, silk stockings, cigars and

contraband Contraband (from Medieval French ''contrebande'' "smuggling") refers to any item that, relating to its nature, is illegal to be possessed or sold. It is used for goods that by their nature are considered too dangerous or offensive in the eyes o ...

. Corrupt police lieutenant Sebastian notifies casino owner and underworld boss Vincent Halloran about the new arrivals. Halloran has been tipped off about an undercover New York City policeman out to lure him into international waters so he can be arrested by British police for the murder of Detective Lombardy. With only three strangers to choose from, Sebastian informs Halloran that Nick is the cop. Halloran hires Julie as a singer, in part to find out what she knows about Nick. He then tries to bribe a puzzled Nick to leave Macao, but Nick is interested in getting to know the curvaceous Julie better and turns him down. Later, Trumble offers the broke Nick a lucrative commission to help him sell a hot diamond necklace, which he accepts as a means of getting a nest egg to start a life together somewhere with Julie. However, when Nick shows Halloran a diamond from the necklace, Halloran recognizes it as part of the same cache he had sent to Hong Kong only a week earlier to be sold. Now certain of Nick's identity, he lays a trap for Nick, who gets knocked out and taken prisoner. Nick is guarded by two thugs and Halloran's girlfriend and head '' croupier,'' Margie. Worried that Halloran is planning to dump her for Julie, the jealous Margie helps Nick escape, with instructions to take Julie with him when he goes. The thugs discover Nick is missing and headed by Halloran's murderous henchman, Itzumi, pursue him on a wild chase down to the waterfront. When Trumble happens on the late-night fracas he tries to help Nick, and, mistaken by the thugs for him, is killed. Before dying he tells Nick about having used him in an attempt to entrap Halloran, and the police boat patrolling offshore to capture the dangerous fugitive from justice if he can still be lured beyond territorial waters. When Nick tries to get Julie to go away with him, he learns that Halloran has invited her on a trip to Hong Kong to retrieve his expensive necklace, a rendezvous he instructs her to keep. Nick lurks by the dock and disposes of Itzumi. Taking his place at the helm of Halloran's boat, he steers the unsuspecting kingpin toward the waiting police. After a violent fistfight with Halloran that leaves the mobster unconscious in the water, Nick swims him over to the British authorities. The movie ends with Nick and Julie in a clinch, implying they will head home together to the United States, she having earlier expressed her homesickness to him and he sharing that Trumble had cleared up an outstanding shooting charge against him in New York that lad left him an involuntary exile ever since.

Cast

* Robert Mitchum as Nick Cochran, former

US Signal Corps ) , colors = Orange and white , colors_label = Corps colors , march = , mascot = , equipment = , equipment_label = ...

lieutenant A lieutenant ( , ; abbreviated Lt., Lt, LT, Lieut and similar) is a commissioned officer rank in the armed forces of many nations. The meaning of lieutenant differs in different militaries (see comparative military ranks), but it is often sub ...

with 3 years, 5 months and 26 days of service (e.g. US direct involvement in

WW II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

lasted 3 years, 8 months, 26 days) * Jane Russell as Julie Benton *

as Lawrence C. Trumble *

Thomas Gomez Thomas Gomez (July 10, 1905 – June 18, 1971) was an American actor. Life and career Born Sabino Tomás Gómez, Jr., in New York City, Gomez began his acting career in theater in 1923, studying under actor Walter Hampden in a production of Cy ...

as Police Lt. Felizardo José Espirito Sebastian * Gloria Grahame as Margie *

Brad Dexter Brad Dexter (born Boris Michel Soso; April 9, 1917 – December 12, 2002) was an American actor and film producer. He is known for tough-guy and western roles, including the 1960 film ''The Magnificent Seven'' (1960), and producing several fil ...

as Vincent "Vince" Halloran *

Edward Ashley Edward Montague Hussey Cooper (August 12, 1906 – May 5, 2000) was an Australian born actor, later active in Britain and the United States. Known by his professional name of Edward Ashley (to avoid confusion with a fellow actor Edward Cooper) ...

as Martin Stewart * Philip Ahn as Itzumi * Vladimir Sokoloff as Kwan Sum Tang * Emory Parnell as Ship's Captain

Production

''Macao'' was the second feature that Josef von Sternberg filmed to fulfill a two-picture contract with

RKO Pictures RKO Radio Pictures Inc., commonly known as RKO Pictures or simply RKO, was an American film production and distribution company, one of the "Big Five" film studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Keith-Albee-Orphe ...

then owned by

Howard Hughes Howard Robard Hughes Jr. (December 24, 1905 – April 5, 1976) was an American business magnate, record-setting pilot, engineer, film producer, and philanthropist, known during his lifetime as one of the most influential and richest people in th ...

. (Sternberg's first feature for Hughes was the color epic ''

Jet Pilot An aircraft pilot or aviator is a person who controls the flight of an aircraft by operating its directional flight controls. Some other aircrew members, such as navigators or flight engineers, are also considered aviators, because they ar ...

''). Shooting began in September 1950 and was released in April 1952. Sternberg's habit of handling actors "as mere details of décor" elicited strenuous objections from stars Jane Russell and Gloria Grahame such that "the shooting of ''Macao'' has become a minor legend." John Baxter reports that "fights on the set" were not uncommon, and were manifested in the "strained" performances of the cast. During the final stages of filming, director

was enlisted to perform retakes on a critical fistfight scene between Robert Mitchum and Brad Dexter, because Sternberg's handling was deemed unsatisfactory by producer Alex Gottlieb. Although uncredited, Ray's contribution to the film was recognized by Sternberg. Sternberg, who "despised the script and the close control" by the studio "disowned" responsibility for the production. Only B-roll footage was shot on location in

and

Macau Macau or Macao (; ; ; ), officially the Macao Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (MSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China in the western Pearl River Delta by the South China Sea. With a pop ...

. T.V. actor and host Truman Bradley narrated the film's opening. Jane Russell sings the

Johnny Mercer John Herndon Mercer (November 18, 1909 – June 25, 1976) was an American lyricist, songwriter, and singer, as well as a record label executive who co-founded Capitol Records with music industry businessmen Buddy DeSylva and Glenn E. Wallich ...

and

Harold Arlen Harold Arlen (born Hyman Arluck; February 15, 1905 – April 23, 1986) was an American composer of popular music, who composed over 500 songs, a number of which have become known worldwide. In addition to composing the songs for the 1939 film ...

ballad " One for My Baby (and One More for the Road)", and the

Jule Styne Jule Styne (; born Julius Kerwin Stein; December 31, 1905 – September 20, 1994) was an English-American songwriter and composer best known for a series of Broadway musicals, including several famous frequently-revived shows that also became s ...

and Leo Robin tune "You Kill Me"

Reception

The film recorded a loss of $700,000.Richard B. Jewell, ''Slow Fade to Black: The Decline of RKO Radio Pictures'', University of California, 2016 Biographer Herman G. Weinberg called the film "a critical and box-office fiasco."

Critical response

Critic Bosley Crowther, writing for ''The New York Times'' in 1952, lambasted the characters as "flimflam" and the story "pedestrian", despite some "well-placed direction by Josef von Sternberg in a couple of scenes." Film historian Andrew Sarris in his appraisal of Sternberg's films for

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...

(MOMA), deplores ''Macao'' as a series of "visual coups" assembled "to conceal the meaninglessness of the n-screenaction ..." Whereas Sarris praises the majority of Sternberg's films "for their unity of form and function", ''Macao'' proves "how superficial mere style can be." A particular concern of the Brooklyn Eagle's reviewer was the anything-but-novel setting and atmosphere: "But the plot is one that has seen long service, and that went over big before the war, when a Far East locale definitely established a picture as super-sinister in tone, and the action took the form of thrown knives and clutching hands. 'Macao' has retained the general air of menace along with the arthritic plot....'Macao' may have a story that has seen better days, but Jane Russell's clothes are strictly from now. That's what distinguishes 'Macao' from other films of its type." The New York Post predicted success for the production: "It is contrived but nevertheless absorbing....Streetlines—if they still stand on them for anything—are predicted for 'Macao' and they'll get their money's worth." Journalist and filmmaker John Baxter, writing for the International Film Guide Series, has a higher opinion of the film and lauds the "bravura passages" and the "atmosphere and décor that make the work definitively "Sternbergian". Both Sarris and Baxter acknowledge Sternberg's stylistic signature in the deadly waterfront chase amid the docked fishing boats, as well as the amusing bedroom scene where an electric fan reduces a pillow to "a storm of feathers." In 2005, film critic Dennis Schwartz, writing for ''Ozus' World Movie Reviews'', lauded the casting of Jane Russell and Robert Mitchum: Baxter laments that ''Macao'', though "not a classic work ... ill-deserves its present obscurity."Baxter, 1971. P. 168

References

Sources

* Baxter, John. 1971. ''The Cinema of Josef von Sternberg''. The International Film Guide Series. A.S Barners & Company, New York. * Sarris, Andrew. 1966. ''The Films of Josef von Sternberg''. Museum of Modern Art/Doubleday. New York, New York.

External links

* * * * * (Jane Russell sings "

One for My Baby "One for My Baby (and One More for the Road)" is a hit song written by Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer for the movie musical '' The Sky's the Limit'' (1943) and first performed in the film by Fred Astaire. Background Harold Arlen described the ...

") * {{Mel Ferrer 1952 films 1952 adventure films 1952 crime films American black-and-white films Film noir Films directed by Josef von Sternberg Films directed by Nicholas Ray Films set in Macau Films shot in Macau Films produced by Samuel Bischoff Films produced by Howard Hughes American crime films American adventure films RKO Pictures films 1950s English-language films 1950s American films