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"The Inn of the Sixth Happiness" (1958): Has anyone seen it?

worcestershire
Member
#1 · Posted: 14 Jul 2010 04:50
The movie The Inn of the Sixth Happiness, made in 1958 and starring Ingrid Bergman, is one of the best movies I have ever seen and the closest Hollywood has ever come to filming a real Tintin story so far. It tells the story of a British servant woman, Gladys Aylward, and her journey to China in the 1930s, at the time of the invasion by Japan - in other words, the same time as the Tintin adventure The Blue Lotus was taking place.
The cinematography is splendid - the movie was filmed in Cinemascope - and the woman's story is accurately portrayed, with Robert Donat in the role of the mandarin - a role that proved to be his last, as he died of his asthma before the end of filming, but after his scenes were in the can.
number1fan
Member
#2 · Posted: 14 Jul 2010 06:20
Yes it's a wonderful film - I've seen it many times.
It does have a flavour of The Blue Lotus about it.
Tintinrulz
Member
#3 · Posted: 22 Jul 2010 01:40
I haven't seen this movie but I'm a fan of Ingrid Bergman's work, so I'll see if I can track it done.
Why did Hollywood feel they had to have white people play the roles of other colours? If you ask me it's ridiculous, offensive and looks plain stupid.
worcestershire
Member
#4 · Posted: 2 Oct 2010 23:57
The Wikipedia entry on this movie mentions that there are some discrepancies between the heroine's real life story and the movie (Notably, the real inn was the Inn of the Eighth Happiness...).
This is not technically the film-makers' fault, but is rather due to the fact that the movie was largely shot in Wales instead of China, as originally intended.
Tintinrulz:
Why did Hollywood feel they had to have white people play the roles of other colours?

The reason for the Caucasian actors portraying Asians in the film was very likely because there was a dearth of Asian actors in the film industry at that time, and to make Ingrid Bergman look smaller.
This was because she was 5'10'', blonde and Scandanavian and the real Gladys was a less than five foot tall, dark-haired Cockney (the film is based on a biography of Aylward titled The Small Woman) - hence the tall actors in the cast. She actively disliked the movie, and was not happy with the changes to her and her story.

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