Shanghai (1935) DVD-R

Starring Loretta Young, Charles Boyer, Warner Oland, Alison Skipworth, Fred Keating,
Charley Grapewin
Directed by James Flood

Print: black/white
Runtime: 75 min.
Genre: drama
Print Quality: B

The stigma of miscegenation (horrors!) is at the base of this very dated romantic
melodrama. Charles Boyer stars as Dmitri Koslov, an enterprising Eurasian who rises from
rickshaw driver to powerful industrialist, all the while concealing his mixed parentage.
Koslov falls in love with beautiful American Barbara Howard (Loretta Young), but dares not
propose marriage because he is half-Chinese. Even so, Barbara insists upon trailing after
the elusive Koslov into the mountainous regions of China, symbolically shedding all her
valued possessions to finance her odyssey. But East is East and West is West, thus the
"forbidden" alliance between hero and heroine must end on an unhappy note. Swedish-born
Warner Oland once again convincingly impersonates an Asian as a Chinese ambassador.