Bagdad

This time it is not an Universal Studios colorful exotic adventure from the late forties starring Maria Montez and Jon Hall, but Maureen O'Hara and Vincent Price as an exquisite traitor; how could it be else? But seeing Maureen O'Hara - the Scarlet O'Hara of Hollywood - in an Arab prince's daughter, well, it adds to the charm of this totally unbelievable and incredible tale...The flaming Irish red headed star can not look like an Arab woman in anyway, unlike Maria Montez or Yvonne De Carlo - but with lost of make up for those two.... So, for once I think there was a midcast in this agreeable little feature, which the topic is so predictable. But beware, despite the title, it is not a One Thousand and One Nights story, but a more or less modern adventure feature. Maureen O'Hara will also play with Charles Lamont in FLAME OF ARABY. Same kind of film too.

It is a rousing , moving , stirring tale , though mediocre , and with action as well as thrills without much sense . And it packs a colorful photography in Technicolor , with color de Luxe . Adventure and thrilling movie and as title indicates set in Bagdad in the turbulent Oriental wars . Princess Marjan (Maureen O'Hara) , the daughter of a Bedouin wealthy , returns home from attending a college in England, and finds her father has been killed and Hassan (Paul Hubschmid or Paul Christian), the leader of a suspicious bunch known as the Black Riders , the main suspect . Leaders of the machinations against her father's people are the military governor Turkish Pasha Al Nadim (Vincent Price) who is lurking sinisterly , and a cousin (John Sutton) of a prince , as well . This is a film in which all the magic of thrilling Bagdad is shown ¿ . Lips against lips... sword against sword... in the world's fabulous city of sin! The picture of 1001 pleasures! ...1001 adventures! ...1001 delights!

Oriental adventure with all the usual ingredients , including glowing colour and distinctive photography in Cinemascope . Adventure and stirring movie set in Bagdad , including bandits , a nasty governor , gorgeous dancers , intriguing sheiks , and many other things . Maureen O'Hara gives an average acting the daughter of a sheik who swears to avenge his daddy and is soon involved the intrigue and plots between the Bedouins and the Arabs. Along the way , she dances and sings lousy songs . O'Hara managed to spring from this ridiculous camp Oriental Adventure outing to stardom . Maureen played brave females in several Adventure/Pirate movies during the 40s and 50s in Universal Pictures , similar to Yvonne DeCarlo ,in fact the latter was originally cast as Princess Marjan. However, she had recently been ill and lost a lot of weight, so much that the producers decided to replace her with Maureen O'Hara . Maureen interpreted various Muslim girls in Simbad the Sailor , Flame of Araby and Bagdad . She also performed the daughter of a powerful lord in The Black Swain , a valiant aristocrat in The Spanish Main , a feared pirate woman called Spitfire in Against All Flags and a French countess in Trípoli . Later on , in 1952 she starred At Sword point as Musketeer Athos' daughter , an untamed Australian girl in Kangaroo and finally the known Lady Godiva . There's also the ordinary good-looking , handsome partenaire , the German Paul Christian who starred a lot of adventure movies , as well . Adding a good support cast , such as : John Sutton , Jeff Corey , Frank Puglia , David Wolfe , Fritz Leiber and special mention for Vincent Price who often played baddie roles . Vincent is well , but this is an inferior vehicule for his high skills .

Colorfully produced by Robert Arthur and Universal International , being accompanied by brilliant and glimmer cinematography carried out by director of photography by Russell Metty who photographed numerous super-productions . Shooting in the ordinary locations from Alabama Hills, Lone Pine , Vasquez Rocks Natural Area Park , Santa Clarita, Universal Studios backlot , Iverson Ranch , Lane, Chatsworth , Universal City Plaza, Universal City, California . Thrilling as well as moving musical score by Frank Skinner , including Oriental sounds . The motion picture was regularly directed by the prolific artisan Charles Lamont . He churned out numerous one- and two-reel comedies for various producers, including Mack Sennett and Al Christie, and began directing features in the mid-'30s. Lamont was a staple of such independent studios as Chesterfield and Republic, for whom he turned out many action, western and comedy films, but he found his niche at Universal in the late 1930s, and directed several comedies for Universal's top comedy team of Bud Abbott and Lou Costello, including : Abbot and Costello meet the mummy , Abbott and Costello meet the Keystone Korps , Abbott and Costello Go to Mars , Meet Captain Kidd , Abbott and Costello meet the invisible man , Meet Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde , In the Foregn Legion , Hit the ice ; furthermore , other comedies as : Francis in the haunted house and Ma and Pa Kattle series such as : Ma and Pa Kattle on vacation , Ma and Pa Kattle in the Ozarks , Ma and Pa go to town . And he made noir cinema as : The dark hour , International crime , A shot in dark and other Oriental adventures : Salome where she danced and Flame of Araby with Maureen O'Hara again .

Bagdad is a Hollywood B movie from the 1940's that was given an unusually generous budget which covered its production in Technicolor as well as the services of three actors already recognised as stars, Vincent Price, Maureen O'Hara and John Sutton. This presumably indicates the Studio bosses who approved production felt they had a better than average script, capable of generating a very successful movie. More realistically, the script was the turkey that prevented real success and with less generous budgetary decisions it would have sunk without trace within a few months of its release.

Four extant IMDb User Comments on this film point out that Maureen O'Hara did not look like a Turkish Princess, an Arabian, an Iraqi, or a Bedouin Arab. These commentators were right in all four cases, she looked like the pale skin, redheaded Caucasian beauty she actually was. But two interesting observations follow - firstly the story in this film was so confused that, even among the relatively few comments already on this database, her character has been assigned four different nationalities; and secondly it seems strange the production budget could not even cover the cost of darkening her hair and skin (or that of co-stars Vincent Price , Paul Christian and John Sutton) - surely a minimal demand for the make-up department. Such discrepancies abound throughout this film and rob it of any validity as a serious work. Its setting is the pre-World War I Ottoman empire, but the language is (erratically) similar to the high society English of the early Georgian period and does not match the story any better than the makeup. The stars all appear to have been well aware of these deficiencies and, recognising that the film would almost certainly finish up being classified as a turkey, they decided not to attempt to compensate for them, but instead to overact outrageously -chewing up the scenery in grand style so that a fun time could be had by all. This type of film usually disappears quickly and totally soon after its release; instead Bagdad is still with us (both as a VHS tape and periodically on cable television) because they did this so effectively that, once we have accepted exactly what is being presented, we can still settle down and have a lot of fun watching it once in a while.

It has been said this was Maureen O'Hara first real starring role. Most of her fans would not accept this, but it was one that provided her with an exceptional opportunity which she seized with both hands and feet. Not only beautiful but active and athletically graceful, she is a pleasure to watch. Her fiery temperament only adds to the fun, and watching her outwit all her very threatening adversaries probably appeals to most children of all ages. Vincent Price, as the deadliest of these, plays up to her as only he can. Overall this may not be the most convincing recipe for creating a collectible film, but after accepting its limitations (and with appropriate acknowledgments to some excellent work behind the camera) I must recognise that in this instance it appears to have largely succeeded. For me, a VCD of 'Bagdad' remains a minor but still enjoyable part of my home video collection, even though NOT to be found among my historical films.

7 years after striking box-office gold with ARABIAN NIGHTS (1942), Universal were still milking the same exotic formula with moderate success; in fact, after the star of that film's female attraction (Maria Montez) started to wane, they called on fiery, red-headed Irish beauty Maureen O'Hara – who had already appeared in RKO's SINBAD THE SAILOR (1947; co-starring Douglas Fairbanks Jr.) – to fill in her shoes in BAGDAD and, later on, FLAME OF ARABY (1951; co-starring Jeff Chandler) which I have yet to catch up with. The threadbare plot line of English-educated Arab princess O'Hara seeking revenge on the leader of the "Black Robes" – for causing her father's death after letting him down in battle against a confusing number of rival Arab tribes! – is nothing to write home about but, thankfully, this is made up for by an agreeably camp attitude that permeates the whole film and makes the viewing more enjoyable than it ought to be. O'Hara makes for a fetching heroine in her Technicolored exotic attire (including one in which she seems to have a drape attached to her head gear!) and, despite her royal heritage, she even gets to belt out 3 operatic songs in a tavern and impersonate a gypsy dancer out in the desert!; villainous Turkish Pasha Vincent Price keeps slapping everybody around and, bafflingly, has his right eyelid almost completely closed the whole time!; Paul Christian (aka Paul Hubschmid of Fritz Lang's famed "Indian Epic" diptych), sporting a distracting Austrian accent, is another Arab 'misfit' prince with a chameleon-like personality that sees him being, alternately, a guest and a fugitive in Price's palace; John Sutton – whom I will soon get the chance to see in similar surroundings in the notoriously cheap Sam Katzman production of THIEF OF DAMASCUS (1952) – plays yet another Arab chieftain whom greed and ambition has not only turned into Price's partner-in-crime but also the leader of the Black Robes; renowned character actor Jeff Corey is O'Hara's ill-tempered associate, etc. Unfortunately, the video quality of the copy I landed is far from optimal (hazy and slightly washed-out) but still serviceable under the circumstances given that, due to the current international political and financial climate, the emergence of such films on legitimate DVD editions is growing remoter with each passing day! Having said that, I look forward to getting my hands on more lightweight, nostalgic stuff in the same vein in the future.

A memorable film from several points. The color was terrific; the songs that Maureen O'Hara trilled had style; the costumes were overdone; the acting and dialogue, with all those "thee's" and "thou's" were unbelievable. Maureen must have been in Elizabethan England before returning to Bagdad. I really think the whole crew, including writers, must have had a hilarious time making this screwy movie. It is so bad, it is good.