La posada de la sexta felicidad

Once more, in this film as she had in her earlier films, Ingrid Bergman proves she was "A PERFECT ACTRESS!" In this film, "Inn of the Sixth Happiness," she plays Englishwoman Gladys Aylward who knew that China was the place where she belonged. Not qualified to be sent there as a missionary she worked and saved her money until she had enough to go on her own. Once there, she meets up with people who manage to help her through her first days. Then, she is nearly all alone and must make it or leave China. She stays. Eventually, just as WW2 is breaking out, she rescues over 100 children and takes them to freedom.

Again, I repeat, it clearly shows Ingrid Bergman as a perfect actress. She shows her talent and charm all through this film and it is one everyone in the family can watch and appreciate. I highly recommend it.

Inn of the Sixth Happiness is a great epic. The story is surprisingly a true one - Gladys Aylward was a British servant who believed her calling was to preach in China.

Inn of the Sixth Happiness was done in the old Hollywood style with a bit of romance built in, but that seems to be the only way they deviated from the real story.

Ingrid Bergman does a wonderful job of recreating Gladys and the movie cinematography really captures the old China I knew.

I would highly recommend this to anyone who wants to be entertained, and to anyone with a sense of adventure.

The Inn Of Sixth Happiness is a film about faith, but more importantly about faith AND works. What is the point of simply saying "I am a Christian", if you just sit in a comfortable house on a well kept street, and read your Bible once a month, and go to church for an hour each Sunday, but never care enough about other people to be ready to sacrifice your life for them to hear the gospel? Gladys was a young woman who felt led by God to go to one of the poorest, uncivilized areas of the world, to preach the story of Jesus, brave a treacherous trip across many lands, learn a strange new language, face the hostility of a people with a different religious background, etc. Comparitively few professing modern Christians would ever put themselves in the line of fire as Gladys did. Ingrid Bergman does a beautiful job playing the role. It was obvious she researched the woman quite deeply and cared about her part. Apparently after the film was made she tried to visit Gladys, but arrived several days too late: Gladys had died. In her modest home Ingrid saw a book with press clippings about the film that Gladys had put together. She had heard second hand that Gladys hadn't been too thrilled with the film; however the "fan book" seemed to declare that bit of gossip a fallacy.

Robert Donat does a wonderful job of acting as the leading official of the town. It doesn't matter that he was not an Asian actor, he makes it quite believable. Kudos to him. Curt Jurgen is masterful and manly as the soldier Gladys grows to love. I like the way the two of them slowly mellow towards each other during the progression of their relationship; it is one of the chief delights of the film.

I highly recommend this film to people of faith and to people without faith in God. With so few major motion pictures ever made about people who desire to preach the Christian gospel, it is a nice change to view this classic movie and be inspired.

A lot has been said, both positive and negative, about the main Asian roles played by Caucasian actors in this film. As an Asian of Chinese descent myself, I've learnt not to get too bent up over this, especially when one considers when this movie was made.

I just recently got the DVD and watched it for the second time after a gap of more than 20 years and I still see the magic of the movie and why it remains inspiring. There are, of course, quite a few creative licenses taken at the expense of the actual life of Gladys Aylward (which IMHO is actually much more inspiring) but that is to be expected with cinema.

What surprised me even more was that Robert Donat who played the Mandarin (the literal translation of his title in the movie would be County Governor; ie. Hsien Chang or 縣長) actually spoke better Mandarin than Peter Chong who played Yang the cook who I assume isn't a native Mandarin speaker.

All in all, I thoroughly enjoyed it and felt the same awe and emotions as when I first saw it as a young boy.

I really liked the old hollywood feel of this movie. NO graphic sex, no graphic language just for the sake of having shock value. This movie pulled you into the characters like a great book and you wanted Gladys to succeed, yet it was not always a sure thing. She is wonderfully flawed in an average way. She has a resilent faith, that enables her to overcome truly epic conditions in a heroic manner. Everyday people with that kind of faith can be heroic. It is a wonderful movie I would love to see transferred to DVD.