Rio (1939) User Reviews (8)

An oddball Universal "A" and possible "proto-noir"

[melvelvit-1 · 7/10 · 22 December 2010]

A Parisian swindler (Basil Rathbone) sentenced to Devil's Island eventually escapes to find his wife (Goldwyn Edsel Sigrid Gurie) has fallen in love with another man (Robert Cummings)...

The year 1939 is considered a high water mark in Golden Age Hollywood's studio era but RIO is a movie I doubt we'll hear much about in the future (godknows, I never did in the past). It's an odd-ball Universal "A" with a "name" cast (Basil Rathbone, Victor McLaglen, Robert Cummings, Leo Carillo, Billy Gilbert, and, at the time, Sigrid Gurie) and probably a "programmer" (a movie shown as the bottom half of a double-bill in big theaters and by itself in smaller venues) that came and went rather quickly. The IMDb labels it "film noir" but it's not -not that I could see, anyway. If anything, it's quite possibly a "proto-noir" but that's only because of the director, German émigré John Brahm (THE LODGER, HANGOVER SQUARE, THE LOCKET) and the fact the protagonist is an "anti-hero", something unusual for movies in 1939. Rathbone's the star -it's his adventures we're following- and being France's answer to Bernie Madoff and a cold-blooded murderer made him no less likable. Basil was right at home as a French fancy pants but making with the beefcake was pushing it a bit, especially when stripped to the waist on a chain gang or making a daring escape through the swamps. The setting was quite ambitious (Paris, Devil's Island, various nightclubs, the South American jungle, Rio during Carnivale) and nicely realized, considering, but those four songs were there, no doubt, to pad it out -or promote Sigrid Gurie, who warbled three of them (which was two too many if you ask me). Siggie was launched the year before by Samuel Goldwyn as "The Norwegian Garbo" when he starred her in THE ADVENTURES OF MARCO POLO and if her talents had been more than modest, it probably wouldn't have mattered when the press later found out she was born in Brooklyn -but it did and she faded fairly quickly. I'd give it a "recommended if it's not going out of your way" -provided it ever pops up anywhere.

Not To My Taste, But Rathbone Is Great!

[boblipton · 6/10 · 8 November 2021]

Basil Rathbone is a very wealthy man, until it turns out he isn't; there's a lot of fraud, so he winds up going to Devil's Island. His wife, singer Sigrid Gurie, is kept in thrall, with sidekick Victor McLaglen keeping an eye on her. But drunk Robert Cummings falls in love with her and she with him. She's still loyal to Rathbone, so Cummings goes far away and reforms. Meanwhile, Rathbone learns of the incipient affair, and escapes from Devi's Island, and heads to where Miss Gurie is performing, and Cummings -- in a pencil-thin mustache -- is hoping.

Rathbone is magnetic as the scheming dirtbag, sharp and sardonic and manipulative. Miss Gurie sings three sings, and Cummings plays his role adequately. McLaglen is very god, and there are some nice bits by Billy Gilbert, Leo Carillo, and Irving Pichel.

Not too much here, even for fans of Basil Rathbone

[bmacv · 5/10 · 27 August 2001]

John Brahm's Rio is often cited as an early (1939) precursor of what would become, a few years later, film noir. But it doesn't have a great deal going for it, though Brahm later did creditable work in the cycle (The Brasher Doubloon, Hangover Square, The Locket). Basil Rathbone, best known of course as Sherlock Holmes, puts aside his deerstalker's cap and meerschaum pipe to portray a swindling international financier who, along with his songstress wife (Sigrid Gurie, whoever she was), seem to be the toast of le tout Paris. Alas, he's arrested and sent to rot in one of those French-colonial penal colonies off the coast of South America (which probably never existed but is conveniently close to Rio de Janeiro). His wife sticks by him for some reason and journeys to Brazil, though she's sorely tempted by Robert Cummings as an engineer fallen into hard times and the bottle. Rathbone, meanwhile, murderously escapes to Rio.... The plotline lacks tension and, save for Rathbone's Sten-gun elocution, there's not much acting to savor either -- though Gurie sings a few songs in decadent nightclub settings. Some viewers might be happy to hear them.

a formerly wealthy man winds up at Devil's Island

[blanche-2 · 6/10 · 10 January 2022]

In Rio, Basil Rathbone is Paul Reynard, a wealthy man seeking a loan from several banks. Actually, it transpires that he has given them all a lot of fraudulent bonds as collateral.

On his anniversary, he's arrested and shipped to Devil's Island. He makes his sidekick Dirk (Victor McLaglen) promise to keep an eye on his lovely wife Irene (Sigrid Gurie). Broke, Irene returns to her career of singing.

She then meets Bill Gregory (Robert Cummings), an engineer who was involved in a bridge that collapsed due to faulty materials - not his fault, but he is blamed. The two fall in love, although she stays loyal to her husband.

Reynard, however, escapes. There the trouble begins.

This is an odd, dark film, with some excellent performances. There are some good scenes - Reynard escaping through the swamp, Rio at Carnivale, and the nightclub scenes.

Not as good as the director's (John Brahm) other films, but recommended for fans of Rathbone and for the performances and atmosphere.

If the moccasins don't get them, the ants will!

[mark.waltz · 7/10 · 26 June 2022]

Devil's Island isn't the easiest person to escape from, but convicted embezzler Basil Rathbone will try. He was arrested in Paris for phony bonds, taken away in handcuffs at a nightclub where his illustrious wife, singer Sigrid Gurie, was being serenaded in song. The lights go out momentarily, and when they go on, he's already at the exit, and he's unable to get to him. When they finally do see each other before he's taken away down to Brazil, he tells her to divorce him. Along comes drunken American engineer Robert Cummings who somehow ends up in Brazil with her as Rathbone is planning his escape. No Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers dancing to the Carioca in this one. This Rio is filled with danger and intrigue.

Good performances by Rathbone and Cummings (far from the happy-go-lucky screwball comedy star in this one) makes this Universal A picture quite above average, filled with a dark atmosphere and lots of uncertainties for its characters. A huge list of Universal contract player supporting stars features those major abusers of mangled English language, Billy Gilbert and Leo Carrillo fortunately not sucking up a lot of the screen time.

Rathbone, debuting as Sherlock Holmes this year, and playing one of the Frankenstein doctors, has one of his better leading roles, not quite a villain and not quite a hero. Gurie is an exotic actress in the Dietrich mode, and while decent, was just one of many imitators so that explains why she's not so well known today. The locations are lavish (obviously filmed on standing sets from a Deanna Durbin musical), and the pacing is fast. It's easy to see why with so many great movies in 1939 this one has been forgotten, but it's definitely worth seeking out.

Rio, Mexico?!

[AAdaSC · 4/10 · 18 November 2023]

Well, that was a little bit boring. The cast are good - except Robert Cummings (Bill) as a disgraced engineer who has taken refuge in Rio. His drunken scenes are painful to sit through. He is the new love interest for café singer Sigrid Gurie (Irene) who is plying her trade in Rio as a way to be near her convicted fraudster of a husband Basil Rathbone (Reynard) housed in a jail on a nearby island. She intends to wait for his release but love has other ideas. Meanwhile, Rathbone escapes....

Where on earth is this Rio that the film is based in? I see no Portuguese speaking characters. What I do see is a lot of Spanish speaking Mexican types. There is obviously a place called Rio somewhere in Mexico. If this was Rio, Brazil, we needed some Carmen Miranda entertainment. As an aside, I can't stand Simon Le Bon's voice, so thankfully, the Duran Duran song "Rio" has wisely been left off the film's soundtrack.

The story is only interesting when Rathbone is on screen and the misrepresentation of Rio is criminally poor. We needed to see a tutti-frutti hat and less of Cummings' awful attempt at a drunkard. Victor McLaglen (Dirk) plays Rathbone's close friend with homosexual overtones (no man is that dedicated to another man without a love arrow from Cupid) and he does have a good moment right at the film's end.

Problems with bankers, in night clubs and in the jungle

[clanciai · 8/10 · 5 March 2022]

A bleak and dark drama of a swindler who moves from the pinnacles of fortune in Paris down to misery in a chain gang in the swamps of a Brazilian penal colony, from where he escapes in desperate longing for his wife, whom he knows is in Rio as a celebrated night club singer - she already was in Paris, and she probably moved to Rio just to be closer to him, in case he would escape, but the film never tells this, although it should have informed the audience of the obvious. In Rio, though, she is courted by an alcoholic former piano tuner who turned engineer and failed with a great project, so he took to drinking. There are some very funny scenes with him. He falls desperately in love with her, but then Basil Rathbone succeeds in escaping and finds her again - too late, it seems, for everything. It is difficult to classify this semi-noir of great and exotic adventure, but it definitely is interesting, and they could have made much more of it. Basil Rathbone is excellent, as always, and so is Victor McLaglen, while Sigrid Gurie only makes you long for Marlene Dietrich, who would have made a part like this so much better.

Basil Rathbone and Victor McLaglen shine in this neglected little masterpiece!

[JohnHowardReid · 9/10 · 18 November 2017]

Basil Rathbone (Paul Reynard), Victor McLaglen (Dirk), Sigrid Gurie (Irene Reynard), Robert Cummings (Bill Gregory), Leo Carrillo (Roberto), Irving Bacon (Mushy), Maurice Moscovitz (old convict), Henry Armetta (head waiter), Billy Gilbert (Manuello), Samuel S. Hinds (Lamartine), Irving Pichel (Rocco), Ferike Boros (Maria).

Director: JOHN BRAHM. Screenplay: Aben Kandel, Stephen Morehouse Avery, Frank Partos, Edwin Justus Mayer. Original screen story: Jean Negulesco. Photography: Hal Mohr. Film editor: Phil Cahn. Music director: Charles Previn. Songs (both Gurie): "Love Opened My Eyes" and "Heart of Mine" by Jimmy McHugh, Frank Skinner, Ralph Freed.

Copyright 28 September 1939 by Universal Pictures Co., Inc. New York opening at the Globe: 26 October 1939. U.S. release: 29 September 1939. Australian release: 25 April 1940. 7,005 feet. 77 minutes.

SYNOPSIS: Escaping from a French penal colony, an arch swindler tries to makes life miserable for his innocent young wife.

COMMENT: A bizarre and utterly off-beat film, with some superlative performances (including Irving Bacon giving such a fine portrayal that one regrets the bulk of his career was spent playing innocuous soda-jerks) and highly imaginative direction by John Brahm.

Despite his billing, Victor McLaglen has a smaller role than either Billy Gilbert or Leo Carrillo who both provide some wholly unnecessary comic relief.

OTHER VIEWS: John Brahm's impact on the Class "B" picture is producing one of the strangest sound effects in recent cinema history. It is that of an unmistakable "B" buzzing like and "A". If his "Rio", like his "Let Us Live" of last season, is not a complete triumph of directorial mind over routine plot matter, it represents its victory in a few skirmishes at least. Better still, it represents an effort of a new director to break away from the established pattern and try something new. — The New York Times.