Linbeymusol Wonderful character development!

Konterr Brilliant and touching

Comwayon A Disappointing Continuation

Staci Frederick Blistering performances.

utgard14 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. She's beautiful and sexy even behind the silly makeup. Pidgeon is great fun, yelling his way through the entire movie at every little thing that annoys him. Richard Carlson is quite good. Great support from Frank Morgan as a sympathetic doctor with a drinking problem. Nice cinematography, especially whenever Hedy is on screen. An entertaining movie with a very amusing ending. It helps if you don't take it too seriously.

MartinHafer If you are in the mood for a film where characters scream all the time and the film is about as subtle as a stripper at a Baptist picnic, then do I have a suggestion for you--"White Cargo". "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. As for Lamarr, this performance as a bored sex-pot is not exactly a career highlight!! Overall, this is a very tough to love film. The characters all come off as annoying and stupid--such as Tondaleyo when she begs her new husband to beat her!! Overall, a dopey sex film without any sexual chemistry--just a lot of broad acting, bad acting and shrill direction. It's hard to believe that a fancy-pants studio like MGM could make such a misguided, trashy film as "White Cargo".

dougdoepke Todelayo see man-- Tondelayo want man. Tondelayo see other man--Tondelayo want other man. What Tondelayo want, Tondelayo get. Just bat eye, show leg, man start drool at mouth. Tondelayo funny, make audience laugh. Tondelayo not funny ! -- Tondelayo fire agent, get new script, get new director. Tondelayo make studio pay through nose.I'm not sure what went on at rehearsals, but someone wasn't paying attention. This is one of the more unintentionally laughable performances in Hollywood history, and from a normally good actress. And where did those ridiculous lines come from that LaMarr has to mouth. And who was it that caked on so much greasepaint, her close-ups look like two headlights struggling through a fog bank. No wonder her African seductress was parodied for years on radio and TV. Tondelayo is a cross between Mel Brooks and CB DeMille. There's the making of a pretty good movie in the first half-- about the isolation of colonial representatives during Europe's imperialist era; the sort of thing English author Somerset Maughm excelled at. That male cast also comes across as a believable and promising clutch of characters. Pidgeon especially shines in a difficult role. However, all that dissolves once the film's one and only female slithers into the the room to hiss out her pidgin English. One notable sidelight-- notice the script's pains to make clear that the love-struck Carlson is not marrying a black African. Instead, Tondelayo's blood lines are emphasized as Egyptian and Arabic. In short, the script is more concerned with crossing racial barriers than with the whipping of the natives to beef up company profits. A revealing sign of the times.

fuhgeddaboutit01 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.