White Cargo

Plot synopsis:
Arriving by seaplane to inspect an isolated, but thriving rubber plantation in the African jungle during World War II, Worthing (Richard Ainley) reminisces about the old days, when conditions were much harsher. The film then flashes back to 1910.
The only four white men within hundreds of miles eagerly await the arrival of the riverboat Congo Queen. Wilbur Ashley (Bramwell Fletcher) and his boss, Harry Witzel (Pidgeon), have grown to hate each other. Ashley is finally going home, and the boat is also bringing his replacement, Langford (Richard Carlson), for a four-year stint. The other two white men are the alcoholic doctor (Frank Morgan) and missionary Reverend Dr. Roberts (Henry O'Neill).
Harry and Langford get off to a bad start, and it only goes downhill from there. It takes all of the efforts of the doctor and Roberts to keep the two men from each other's throat. The situation becomes worse when Tondelayo (Lamarr), a seductive native woman, returns. Harry, as resident magistrate, had already previously ordered her to leave his district as a disruptive, amoral influence.
Tondelayo begins to work her wiles on Langford. Despite the warnings by all three of the other men (and perhaps to spite Harry), he eventually succumbs to her charms. When Harry orders her expelled once more, Langford decides to marry her. Roberts reveals that she is not a native, but rather half Egyptian and half Arab, and in spite of his better judgment, reluctantly joins them in holy matrimony.
After five months, Tondelayo has grown bored of her husband. However, when she tries to seduce Harry, he reminds her that she is Mrs. Langford "until death do you part". That gives her an idea. When her husband becomes sick, the doctor gives her some medicine to give him periodically. She obtains poison and makes him drink some of it instead. However, Harry suspects what she is trying to do. He leaves, then returns just as she is about to give Langford another dose. Harry forces her to drink the rest of the poison. She runs away screaming and collapses on the jungle floor.
The doctor takes Langford away on the Congo Queen for better medical treatment. From the boat comes Langford's replacement: a younger Worthing. Harry grabs him and forcefully tells him that he will stick around. Returning to the present, Worthing observes that he did.

Tags: romantic, flashback

Review:
Yes, the plot was silly, the script was poor, and the performances were mostly indifferent; but Hedy's entrance, with the line 'My name is Tondelayo', became a vintage moment in film history.
The one thing that annoyed me, was the insufferably long and boring 30 minutes or more, before Hedy made her entranceAll criticisms aside though, a film like this needs to be viewed, within the context of escapist film entertainment, circa 1942.
So this campy movie was made, with Hedy Lamarr as the incredibly beautiful and seductive Tondelayo, and made millions for MGM.
Thus, 'White Cargo' with legendary beauty Hedy Lamarr rates a 7/10, for providing some fairly mindless, but visually compelling entertainment..
Enjoyed this black & white 1942 film dealing with a British rubber plantation in Africa where Mr. Harry Witzel, (Walter Pidgeon) is in charge of the operations.
There is a young man named Mr. Langford, (Richard Carlson) who has been hired on the plantation and is eager to make big changes in his new position, but the climate soon breaks him down, except he does meet up with a very sexy native gal named Tondelayo, (Hedy Lamarr) who wraps him around her little finger in more ways than one.
Veteran actor Frank Morgan plays the role as an alcoholic doctor who gives a great supporting role and Hedy Lamarr gave a great acting performance as a very dangerous and sexy gal who always gets what she wants.
One can only wonder how many posters of Hedy Lamarr as Tondelayo were pinned up by soldiers in WWII.
Frank Morgan is back, not a The Pirate, but as a drunken doctor that has probably been drummed out of the medical establishment and can only get work on this African plantation.Walter Pidgeon, who would go one to capture two Oscar nominations in the next two years (Mrs. Miniver, Madame Curie), was the leader of the plantation and the colonial law.
He was hilarious as a succession of new assistants arrived in white, freshly starched clothing from the Mother Country, and all said the exact same words that drove him nuts.Of course, he warned all of them about Tondelayo, even banning her from the camp, but it was useless as they all succumbed to her charms.A must-see for those who appreciate what made our fathers happy in the Big One..
In fact the only animal that i found in this movie was that feline femme fatale Hedy Lamarr.
In this one, they were setting up Hedy as Tondelayo, for she didn't appear until a half hour or so into it and boy, when she appeared, I actually felt the heat of that Jungle.
Almost every film buff would watch this and immediately write WHITE CARGO (1942) off the map due to the 'anti camp' syndrome.
HEDY LAMARR's caked-on brown makeup reminded me of Jennifer Jones' 'Pearl Chavez' in the (at times) campy classic DUEL IN THE SUN(which is a personal favorite of mine) made four years later in 1946.
Believe me, White Cargo is worth it just to see Hedy sweat on her dark skin wearing a one-piece bikini top throughout this movie!
Hedy Lamarr eschews acting completely in this delightful tale of sex in the jungle.
Harry, as played by the statue-like Walter Pidgeon, has been in the jungle so long he's starting to act a bit kooky.
Tondelayo is a gorgeous woman, but she likes a good time.
Tondelayo's odd speech patterns are the highlight of this movie--she sounds completely idiotic.This being a 40s film, everyone has to get what's coming to them, in various showy ways.
Hedy looks great and acts badly, and generally seems to be having the time of her life as a Native Girl interested only in cheap sex and even cheaper jewelry.
Hollywood used to turn out some great bad movies, and "White Cargo" is one of the greatest and baddest.
Except for the jungle heat, the isolation of the white guys, and location shots of what looks like a rubber plantation, this movie doesn't even pretend to be real.
Because it combines shameless sensationalism and with solid melodramatic performances (especially from Lamar, Pidgeon, and Wizard-of-Oz Frank Morgan), even my wife liked it.OK, Hollywood and America were a lot more racist in 1942 than now.
But this movie isn't about race, imperialism, natural resources, or any of those other trendy topics, it's about the sensual power of Tondelayo.Goofy makeup and all, it would have been tough to find any actress of any ethnicity who could top Hedy Lamar in the leading role.
Her eyes alone reveal her mind switching from evil to stupid to greedy in rapid succession."White Cargo" is a demented fantasy sequel to Conrad's great story "Heart of Darkness," or an academic poindexter could argue that it is.
First of all I took this film to be a stage play with all four actors having declaimed those lines hundreds of times.
It works very well as a stage play -- the actors in the film deliver the lines as if they had said them for months and each word is carefully enunciated --- no mumbling naturalism or words not made clear to the audience in the back rows.
nevertheless, Walter pigeon, Henry o'O'Neil, frank Morgan, Richard Carlson,and a personal favorite of mine Reginald Owen.
Infamous Bad Movie with a Famous Performance from Hedy Lamarr that became the butt of Jokes for Decades and a WWII G.I. Pinup.
It has some White Supremacist Lines and the Half-Caste Tondeleyo is made to be Egyptian/Arabic instead of White/Black that Definitely was a No-No.The Movie was pretty much Dismissed, Disregarded, and Degraded when it came out, mostly because of the Tawdry Tone.
Today it is Viewed for its Camp Value and also because the Beautiful Miss Lamarr was Scantily Clad, Heavily Made Up, and Spoke in a Native Vernacular that Tarzan would have Appreciated.Warning...Do not play a Drinking Game where you take a Drink Every time the Name Tondeleyo is Uttered, and if You include Acclimatized, there will be no Survivors..
When Langford (Richard Carlson) arrives at the plantation to assist Witzel, the boss tells him 'You haven't got what it takes.
However, the story of the strange beauty leading men into temptation and the basic situation that these few men far away from home depend on each other is good enough to make the movie watchable..
This film is given only a five by me - I stayed up late one night to see it, because I wanted to see Hedy Lamarr in one of her most famous performances.
Pigeon , Carlson, and Morgan (and other males in the cast) are working on a plantation in Africa, and life there is not made easier by the arrival of Lamarr, a half-breed (as they called so-called non-white temptresses in the days of the Hollywood "code").
Carroll produced shows like WHITE CARGO.
The so called action takes place at a rubber area in Africa circa 1910.The film was often monotonous, especially with an off-the wall- performance by Hedy Lamarr, as the temptress, evil Tondelayo.
I found her least provocative here.Walter Pidgeon, as the chief of the rubber plant, is authoritarian and takes an immediate disliking to his new assistant, a terribly miscast Richard Carlson.
Carlson was so much better in I Led 3 Lives.Frank Morgan is there, as a doctor, trying to keep the piece between the 2 guys, but Lamarr reminded me more of a Delilah type.
Lusty half-caste on a British-owned rubber plantation in Africa--speaking in broken English and always preceded by the tinkling of her jewelry--insinuates herself between the two badgering white foremen; she childishly pits the hotheaded adversaries against one another, winner take Tondelayo!
Everyone in this movie is overacting, even Hedy Lamarr if that's possible for her.
One of the campiest, most unintentionally hilarious things ever put on screen.The plot briefly is Walter Pidgeon is both head of a rubber plantation and magistrate of a colonial area, presumably under British possession.
He's getting rid of one assistant and a new one is coming on the plantation.The biggest problem in the district is not disease, heat, jungle animals or natives who don't want to be slaves.
And now she's got her eye on Richard Carlson, Pidgeon's new assistant.
The rest of this story has to be seen to be believed.Hedy Lamarr was an extraordinarily beautiful and sexy woman and that made up for the fact she was not a good actress.
DeMille, no player's director did better for her in Samson and Delilah.Walter Pidgeon, Henry O'Neill, Frank Morgan, Richard Carlson, and Bramwell Fletcher are all gifted performers.
"White Cargo" is a 1942 film starring Hedy Lamarr, Walter Pidgeon, Richard Carlson, Frank Morgan, and Henry O'Neill.The story concerns men on a rubber plantation, bored, hot, and hating it.
As the others predict, his optimism doesn't last long.Then along comes the scourge of the jungle, Tondelayo (Lamarr).
Soon she works her magic on him and his destruction begins.Among Holllywood's spectacular beauties, Hedy Lamarr was in the top 5.
Sporting dark makeup, a bad accent and bad accent, Tondelayo proves to be problematic.I think this was intended as a serious film, and it's very well made, not like some campy movie.
True, Lamarr's role is campy, and it would have been no matter who had acted in it.You can mark this down as an entertaining film about the tropics, a favorite topic over at MGM.
And maybe on Jeopardy Alec Trebek had to run through the "Hedy Lamarr" topic all by himself while the clueless contestants just stood there, but there was a time when everybody had heard of her -- and Tondelayo..
One can't help but go native when encountering Tondelayo (Hedy Lamarr), a local beauty with a great dental plan In White Cargo.
Langford (Richard Carlson) is a newly arrived employee of an African rubber plantation run by the British.
Pidgeon, Carlson, Morgan and Reg Owen lend able support but the arch storyline is creaky even for 42 and Lamarr as jungle girl remains a bit of a stretch in the looks department but her beauty and tenacity make it entertaining enough and given the time (WW ll) must have been a welcome sight to overseas GIs, though my guess is they took little heed to the cautionary addendum about the dangers of fraternizing with locals message..
well, the only thing I can recommend this movie for (besides Hedy's sexy costume) is the cinematography.
Great black and white cinematography, excellent performances by some great character actors (Frank Morgan, AKA The Wizard of Oz, in particular)and the usually wooden Walter Pidgeon, and a promising beginning...until you see the whites of Hedy's eyes.
Two things are suggested in the first scenes which could have made for some nice melodrama: that Tondelayo was more sinned against than sinning and had a certain moral sense, and that her present nemesis Pidgeon had once loved her.
I now have about seven of Hedy's films on DVD/Video so have a means of comparison."White Cargo" is definitely not one of her best parts and I consequently only voted it 3/10.She was badly cast, Walter Pigeon is too melodramatic, and for a film, there was not enough change of scenes for my liking as it heavily betrays the stage play antecedent whence it originated.95% is so obviously made in a studio where the action gets bogged down.For a film supposedly set in Africa, couldn't the budget have stretched to a few more location shots?I know this was wartime (1942) but Florida could have made a good substitute.Once the promising opening sequence is over (of a flying boat landing on a river), we are stuck in the planters shack (in the studio) and from there on its just a lot of bad tempered men shouting at each other and getting drunk.I did not "buy it" that an intelligent man sent by the government to an African plantation would fall for an illiterate savage, Tondelayo, whose only interest seemed to be how many trinkets she could obtain out of the men she meets.I much prefer to see Hedy as the intelligent, sophisticated woman she was and she was so much better cast in say "Boom Town" (1940) with Clark Gable and Spencer Tracy.Indeed in that film despite not having primary billing, she acts Claudette Colbert right off the screen.I also particularly liked her in "Come Live With Me"(1941) with Jimmy Stewart - see my critique of this film..
And you'll spend a restless twenty-five minutes or so before HEDY LAMARR makes her spectacular entrance and says, in a tone she obviously thought would nail her half-breed, dark-skinned character, "I am Tondelayo." For the remainder of my review, I'll quote the article I wrote on HEDY LAMARR for FILMS OF THE GOLDEN AGE magazine: "WHITE CARGO was the kind of film that seemed dated even then.
Even the sturdy cast of players headed by Walter Pidgeon, Richard Carlson and Reginald Owen, could not overcome the weak script and make the tale credible.
Playing her entire role in an abbreviated sarong and dark body make-up, Hedy was still incredibly lovely.
Of Tondelayo, she would later say,'I thought with some interesting make-up, a sarong and some hip-swinging I would be a memorable nymphomaniac.' Obviously, despite her intelligence, Hedy had a problem judging scripts." Just let me conclude by saying that all of the performances are embarrisingly inept, the script is hopelessly full of clichés, and the direction allows everyone to overact in such melodramatic silent screen fashion that it's a wonder anyone had a reputation left after this foolishness was over--including director Richard Thorpe who had better films in his future.Unless Hedy in dark make-up and sarong is enough to hold your interest, WHITE CARGO is better left among the dustbins of film memories..
I think using Hedy Lamarr for this part ruined the whole movie.
Ms. Lamarr looked like a white Austrian actress with dark makeup and she sounded like she was using a phony accent.
Campy melodrama about conflicts on an African plantation between two white men (Walter Pidgeon, Richard Carlson) over an exotic native girl named Tondelayo (Hedy Lamarr).
It's a fun movie with a very memorable performance from Hedy.
Pidgeon is great fun, yelling his way through the entire movie at every little thing that annoys him.
How good can a film be when its leading lady is called 'Tondelayo'?!.
"White Cargo" is a bizarre film and I can't imagine that anyone involved felt particularly proud for their part in this crappy film.The movie is set in Africa at some god-forsaken rubber plantation.
It's run by a cranky guy who screams all the time (Walter Pidgeon) and the doctor is a drunk (Frank Morgan).
When a new assistant (Richard Carlson) comes to camp, his boss welcomes him by screaming and treating him like dirt.
Later, the newbie falls in love with a silly native, Tondaleyo (Hedy Lamarr)--though, aside from her great body, there really isn't much to her.
It's hard to believe that a fancy-pants studio like MGM could make such a misguided, trashy film as "White Cargo"..
I've seen quite a few Hedy Lamarr films, and have a pretty good handle on her style and the breadth of her talent, but nothing prepared me for this.
She plays Tondalayo, a native girl in Africa (half Egyptian and half Arab), who seduces and destroys men at a rubber plantation in the jungle.
Like many native female types of the time, she speaks in pigeon English (me go, me stay, etc.), that is fairly ridiculous, particularly if you understand how intelligent Hedy Lamarr really was.
On the other hand, "White Cargo" was shot in b&w, and Tandalayo only appears in night scenes, allowing shadow and light to play across Lamarr's face in interesting ways.
This time the male leads were played by Walter Pidgeon and Carlson, but in a much different story than "Red Dust."  I've never seen Pidgeon this intense.
It's really hard to watch this scene, and both Pidgeon and Lamarr play it well.
What I find appealing about films like "White Cargo" beyond the exotic setting, is the opportunity for atmosphere and raw, intense drama that takes place in "another world."  It's likely that the reason these films aren't made anymore is because science fiction and alien planets have taken the place of jungles and plantations.
"White Cargo" is not a great film by any means, but not all entertaining films need be masterpieces.
Coincidentally, he went on to do "Green Mansions" and "Mutiny on the Bounty." The main reason to see "White Cargo," however, is Hedy Lamarr.
Very sexy though, you have to admit.Poor old Langford (Richard Carlson), he didn't know what he was in for.
Regarding the lines that Hedy Lamarr was handed, they are sometimes silly, but we know that the only English she has heard was from Pidgeon's character and a few others.
You have expect to hear Hedy Lamarr screech, "Gif me da Cobra Jewel!" in her performance as the supposedly half-caste Tondelayo, an exotic but obviously insane beauty that destroys every man she touches.
When rubber plantation owner Walter Pidgeon looses interest in her, she sets her sights on newcomer Richard Carlson who is no match for her spider woman wiles.
It's based on a 20's play from Broadway and was probably meant as a vehicle to get Hedy Lamarr over with the public as a sex siren.
She is Tondelayo (no relation to Kimona Wannalaya), a dark beauty that tantalizes the Brits at an African rubber plantation and desires lots and lots of silk and baubles.
Walter Pidgeon stars as Harry Witzel, plantation boss and the head of the local colonial district.
(Ashley is played by Bramwell Fletcher, best noted for laughing himself to death at Karloff's revival in The Mummy.) His replacement is Langford (Richard Carlson), full of spit and vinegar and oblivious to Witzel's warning of the "damp rot" that can grab hold of a man.
To make a long story short, Tondelayo is in love with Harry, who ignores her.