The Lady From Shanghai, written and directed by Orson Wells - Eight out of 10

The Lady From Shanghai, written and directed by Orson Wells

Eight out of 10

Having directed what is for many the Best Film Ever – Citizen Kane – Orson Wells has entered history on a white horse and has entered the Pantheon of Cinema as one of the major Gods.

He has stated, in the interesting book called Who the Hell’s In It by Peter Bogdanovich, that the actors and actresses make or break a film, their performance would sink or make a film fly.

Jupiterean as he certainly is, Orson Wells seems to have a more outré, unusual and less mesmerizing accomplishment in The Lady From Shanghai, although this could well be a mistaken perspective.

The accent, manner of speaking selected for Michael O’Hara, the hero of the motion picture may not be the best choice, for it seems artificial, somewhat melodramatic and forced, exaggerated.

The protagonist meets the Lady from Shanghai, Elsa Bannister, who is portrayed by the real life wife of Orson Wells, Rita Hayworth, early on.

There is a setup, an arranged incident, wherein the hero is expected to interfere, save the damsel in distress from thugs, but it is a false circumstance.

This is intriguing and the whole film is a series of arrangements, false pretenses, fake murders and real killers.

Elsa Bannister is married to the older, much less attractive –if at all – rich, excellent lawyer Arthur Bannister aka Everett  Sloane.

The wealthy man has a yacht, about to sail for San Francisco and Michael is offered a job, which he accepts just because he is so infatuated with The Lady From Shanghai.

Also employed by Arthur Bannister is George Grisby, an intriguing, bizarre character.

He has a proposition for the hero.

George Grisby wants to pay Michael O’Hara $ 5,000 – that could be in excess of 100 k today – for a murder.

The protagonist has very little, if any money and if he wants to get anywhere with the woman he may love, he would have to get some money in one way or another.

Only George proposes that Michael kills…him!

The outlandish proposal – rejected by the hero with the self-evident question – why don’t you kill yourself? – is explained.

This man wants to get a new life, seeing as he is wanted, the only clean break he can get is if he stages his own murder, making people believe he is dead, they would stop looking for him – otherwise, they would not end their quest until they get him.

He accepts the offer, but an unexpected man witnesses this arrangement and he confronts George with it.

Therefore, George Grisby kills the unwanted, blackmailing witness.

However, before the victim dies, he has enough time to reach Elsa Bannister.

From here, the plot offers one surprise and shock after another.

After they have a car accident, hitting a car and preparing for the false killing, George Grisby is dead!

Before the unplanned death, they had worked on a confession, which the hero had signed.

The idea was that as long as there is no corpse, Michael cannot be convicted and so they had all the evidence to convince people that George is dead and hence they need to stop looking for him.

However, George is stiff now.

In addition, the case against Michael O’Hara is watertight: confession signed, the murder weapon and everything else.

The man called to defend the accused and eventually save him from the electric chair is a good lawyer, but also jealous.

Will he try to get the client acquitted or make sure he fries?

The Lady From Shanghai is an important landmark in the History of Cinema.