Countess From Hong Kong

Countess From Hong Kong
by Charles Chaplin

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DVD details

Actor: Charles Chaplin, Marlon Brando, Sophia Loren, Sydney Chaplin, Tippi Hedren
Director: Charles Chaplin
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled)
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD-Video, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.85:1
Running Time: 108 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2003-02-04
Audience Rating: G (General Audience)
Studio: Universal Studios

DVD Reviews of Countess From Hong Kong

DVD Review: A boring (and bored) performance by Brando!
Summary: 3 Stars

First of all, I love Brando, love Sophia Loren. I saw this in the theaters when it first came out and I wanted to own it. It wasn't so much that this is a good movie; it's just entertainingly bad. The editing is choppy, the actors move around like they are pieces being placed on a chess board, Brando is obviously BORED and he looks as though he over-acts on purpose in some of the scenes. The extras are AWFUL...the whole movie has an out-of-date feel to it (and not in a good way). There is NO sexual tension between 2 of the sexiest movie stars ever. So, what do I like about it? The absolutely gorgeous love theme "This is my song', watching Sophia Loren's luminous eyes fill with tears, and Marlon Brando doing a semi-tango at the end (although he messes up at one point...watch closely). Yeah, I bought it, still watch it...it is one of my favorite bad movies.

DVD Review: Good dvd quality and service
Summary: 3 Stars

The service was good and so was the quality of the dvd. I have nothing against this vendor regarding this dvd or their service.

DVD Review: Chaplin's Last and Possibly Least
Summary: 2 Stars

Chaplin's final film is alternately a beautiful and meditative love story, and an old-fashioned (in the worst sense of the word) film that shows the limits of its director's abilities.

The lead performances depend on the direction that Chaplin was able to provide. In some scenes, Brando manages to mimic Chaplin perfectly, and it works. In other scenes, he still mimics Chaplin, but the result is less effective. (As a devout Method actor, Brando repeatedly clashed with Chaplin, whose directorial style consisted of having the actors mimic his movements and delivery exactly). Sophia Loren is well-cast as the former Russian countess-turned-dance hall girl who stows away with the newly-appointed ambassador to Saudi Arabia (Brando). Aside from a major error in Chaplin's script (that is, that Loren's character is supposed to have left Russia in the revolution of 1917, which would make her character quite a bit older than she is), Loren plays the role with a comic grace that is both captivating and charming. The supporting cast have their moments: Sydney Chaplin as Brando's friend and advisor, Tippi Hedren as his estranged wife, Margaret Rutherford, in a delightful cameo as an elderly passenger aboard the ocean liner, and in a particularly memorable standout performance, Patrick Cargill as Brando's valet. Cargill shows a gift for comic timing and understated delivery here that makes the viewer wish he had been given more opportunities to demonstrate his talent. He nearly walks away with every scene he's in, and remains perhaps the most memorable part of the film.

Chaplin's use of color and widescreen is appropriately understated in keeping with his style. However, it is in Chaplin's direction that we begin to see the limits of his filmmaking ability, at least in his later works. The cinematography is appropriately understated; however, it is in the editing that the pace of the film begins to bog down. Scenes requiring a frantic pace are edited entirely too slow, losing much of the comic rhythm between the performers. Many scenes are played out in single, long takes, without much interaction between the performers within the frame (they instead appear to have been instructed to stay "on their mark" and deliver their dialog).

Perhaps the film's most memorable aspect is its lush orchestral score composed by Chaplin, and featuring the great "This is My Song", which re-appears throughout the film. Chaplin's abilities as a composer at this point had perhaps outmeasured his abilities as a filmmaker, and-fortunately for future audiences-he spent the next decade composing scores to his silent features of the 1920s.

Universal's DVD of "A Countess from Hong Kong" is an excellent transfer in anamorphic widescreen. The colors are rich and the image sharp. It boasts a clear mono soundtrack, and features a trailer as an extra.

DVD Review: THE LAST PICTURE
Summary: 3 Stars

1967. Written and directed by Charles Chaplin. Last film of the British genius. Not a masterpiece but still with scenes that seem to have popped up from a silent movie. After all, I liked it and that's all that matters to me.

DVD Review: Countess From Hong Kong
Summary: 5 Stars

This is a great old movie. Setting is dated but the story and acting are great. Marlon Brando could do comic acting! Has a very good scene about seasickness on a cruise ship. Buy it.

Description of Countess From Hong Kong

Charlie Chaplin's last film is the cinematic equivalent of Willie Mays staying too long in baseball--a sad farewell from someone who has clearly lost his touch. Marlon Brando (who famously did not get along with Chaplin and initiated, with this film, his curious habit of undermining his directors' best intentions) plays an American millionaire leaving Hong Kong to assume an ambassadorship. He discovers Sophia Loren--playing a daughter of Russian aristocrats and a former gangster moll--concealed in his closet onboard the outbound ship, hoping to gain passage to the States. Brando, looking none too pleased, agrees to help her, with not terribly comic or romantic results. Chaplin's one modestly clever touch is to have the camera rock gently and slowly back and forth, ostensibly emulating the movement of the luxury liner. The humor falls flat, Brando and Loren have no chemistry, and the story isn't terribly engaging. The former Little Tramp appears, mercifully briefly, as a seasick steward who opens and closes a door, swooning in between. Appropriately enough, in silence. --David Kronke

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