上海小姐

1. shanghai | ʃaŋˈhʌɪ | transitive verb (shanghais, shanghaiing, shanghaied) 1) historical: force (someone) to join a ship lacking a full crew by drugging them or using other underhand means. 2) informal: coerce or trick (someone) into a place or position or into doing something other than this and the air of mystery that Shanghai gives to Elsa (Rita Hayworth), I could find no other factors in this film that is related to Shanghai - or, rather, the Shanghai that I know. I must try to forget about this before I start a race-and-ethnicity-themed ramble.

2. Also, Orson Welles's fake Irish accent is just as disturbing as Rita Hayworth's Chinese (Cantonese).

3. But hey, Rita Hayworth. Yeah I know. Bold, mysterious, immensely charming, sexy to the extent of being implicitly promiscuous (it was hinted that she may have been a high-class prostitute before she married Bannister) - and most importantly, dangerous. Femme fatale to its finest. (But still under the male gaze, of course.)

4. Mike O'Hara (Orson Welles) is essentially a reinvention of the Byronic hero (which is almost narcissist, in a sense?). Just like most noir heroes, he is watched by fate (or God?) all the time - note the camera angle. This portrayal is of course related to the influence of the Gothic romance. When seen with the other main characters of the male sex (who are all more sinister and much more filthy rich) than him, Mike could maybe be understood as a representation of the working class.

5. Law is depicted as nothing but a corrupt joke in this film. The attorney's chess playing while waiting for the jury to come to a decision, the best criminal lawyer's cross-examination of himself, and even the fake confession letter (gosh that letter sounds so fake!) - all this is ridiculed as just a game that really, in the end, gives no one justice. But the pistol does give justice.

6. New York City, oh the greatest city of all time, is seen as an intricate labyrinth and an enigma. The labyrinth of plot gives you this sense of being trapped and fooled and, yeah, basically being shanghaied. It's all a game (I mean, hey, an amusement park for the climax scene) about money, sex and crime, really.

7. The Germans. The sense of disorientation, given by the labyrinth-like city, is visualized through the complex use of mirrors and irregular shapes in the climax scene, which is, obviously, a tribute to German expressionism. And the Freudian implications of lust, the wartime/postwar angst ("the gas chamber")...

8. I'll take a wild guess here. The beautiful aquarium sequence, with Mike and Elsa's silhouettes, in some way inspired Woody Allen's planetarium sequence in Manhattan.

9. This was the first film that I properly watched at Birkbeck Cinema, just several doors away from the great Laura Mulvey and three houses from where the Bloomsbury Group came into being. I'd love to have a glass of champagne to this new start. So, cheers.

Ref.: http://www.filmsite.org/ladyf3.html

《上海小姐》 一个没有特点的人，不算是一个有本事的人。 如果我能预知到结果，那我就不会去做。直到我遇到她，我的脑子就不够用了。 “我不是那样的，我只是试图装出来” “继续装下去，你就会变成那样” 开口闭口就是钱和谋杀，我要疯了，要么就是这些家伙疯了。 “我在上海学会了怎么看看待爱” “就像在法国人们怎么看待笑” “中国人认为爱情是很难永恒不变的……因此一个狂热的去爱的人最后还是会厌倦爱情” “那么他就会和你离婚” “那我就得不到一分钱” “钱对你那么重要吗” “我告诉你，甜心，你不了解这世界上的一些事情” “那在我所受的教育中倒是没听说过” 游乐场里众多玻璃镜的开枪镜头太有趣了。 “你是个聪明的女人，只是犯太多错了。” “江山易改本性难移，但你忘记了人性还有很多美好的东西。” 男:“你说过这个世界太黑暗，我们没法逃离，我们只能和这黑暗共处，与它妥协，现在这黑暗来找你了，来达成它的协议。” 女:“你可以斗争下去，但好处是什么？” “每个人都曾被别人欺骗，唯一可以忘掉的方法就是时间，所以我想随着时间的流逝我会忘掉一切，也许我会活很久，以至于我会忘掉她，也许到死也不会。”

00:30:45 — 00:32:02

Once, off the hump of Brazil

I saw the ocean so darkened with blood it was black

and the sun fainting away over the lip of the sky

We’d put in at Fortaleza

And a few of us had lines out for a bit of idle fishing

It was me had the first strike

A shark it was, then there was another

Another shark again

Till all about, the sea was made of sharks

And more sharks still, and no water at all

My shark had torn himself from the hook

and the scent or maybe the stain it was

of him bleeding his life away

drove the rest of them mad

Then the beasts took to eating each others

In their frenzy, they ate at themselves

You could feel the lust of murder like a wind stinging your eyes

And you could smell the death reeking up out the sea

I never saw anything worse until this little pinic tonight

And you know

There wasn’t one of them sharks in the whole crazy pack that survived