tracetaylor Does absolutely no - one realizes this is an attempt to update Orson Welles film with his once gorgeous wife - Rita Hayworth. Brains anyone ?

FinerFilmFanatic I'm glad to see that I'm not the only person who thinks this film isn't a complete waste of time.I first rented the movie waaaaay back when it first came out on video and actually quite liked it. Then when it became available to buy, I hot footed it down to HMV to get my own copy, and I wasn't disappointed.Let's start off with Madonna. First of all, she looks gorgeous in this. And you know what, her acting isn't that bad. Yes, you read me right, she's not bad. What lets her down, however, is the clunky dialogue. Not even Meryl Streep could do much with this. But she's more than competent with what she has to work with.As for the story, well, it was never going to be a contender for film of the year, but it's straight forward enough and even has a little twist at the end (and no, I didn't see it coming). Madonna is a missionary out in Shanghai, trying to procure opium while Sean Penn is a... not sure exactly what he is, but he ends up helping Madonna against the baddies. Yes, it's full of clichés, but it's upbeat and doesn't take itself too seriously.I realise that the film won't be to everyone's tastes, but it's honestly not that bad.

boingo_the_clown The IMDb advises that I should say ...*Warning Spoilers Follow*.... but there is no way to spoil this movie, because it is already spoiled to the point of being compost, and is ready to be spread out on the fields.It has been almost 20 years since my girlfriend of the time, an obsessive Madonna fan, talked me into seeing this piece of trash, and I still go to bed at night praying to God that I can somehow get that two hours of my life back. This is not one of those movies that is so bad it is good. This is one of those movies that is so bad it actually slingshots right around past good and right back to bad again.Madonna stars as a missionary (I know this is a leap of faith folks, but I am *not* kidding!), who teams up with Sean Penn (her then husband) to search for "Faraday's Flowers", a cache of opium balls she hopes can be used as a pain killer for wounded troops. From about this point on, the movie takes on a rhythm that more or less goes "1, 2, 3, plot twist, 1, 2, 3, plot twist, 1, 2, 3, plot twist, and so on", as the duo of Penn and Penn bounce around randomly from one ridiculous situation to another with plenty of plot twists, but absolutely no plot evident to be twisted. In the mean time, they are being chased by a corrupt official with prosthetic hands (He lost his real hands from opening a booby trapped money belt called a "shanghai surprise", which is what the movie is supposedly named after. This seems appropriate to me, seeing how I had lost my money from watching this booby trapped movie.).You may wonder why it is that I am able to remember so much about a movie I haven't seen in almost 20 years. To that I can only say one thing ...... emotional scarring.This movie is that bad folks! I have seen a lot of bad movies in my time, but this one rules as the unchallenged chief god in my pantheon of stinkers. It makes Ed Wood's movies look like Academy Award winning material. It even makes the worst of the worst of the flash animation that I have seen over the last six years on the net look good. I would eagerly gnaw my foot off to escape from this movie.If, for some reason, you are ever unfortunate enough to find a copy of this little "gem" on the shelf of your local video store, the only thing I can recommend is that you slowly and carefully turn yourself around, then run, run! RUN!!!!!, and immediately seek psychiatric counseling so as to avoid any possible post traumatic stress syndrome you may suffer from exposure to this movie.I give this movie a 1, but that is only because IMDb will not let me input negative numbers.

CTS-1 OK. So someone took an A-list actor and his famous singer/ part time kind of-sort of actress wife and decided that the movie would be carried on the weight of the names alone. Substitute "fiancee" for wife and one has Gigli.But it is not- it is Shanghai Surprise, possibly the most ill-conceived movie of the 1980's (and yes, I have seen "Hobgoblins.")This movie has no redeeming qualities whatsoever. Ridiculous plot, painfully bad acting (Madonna as a missionary? She didn't buy it either, so she says her lines in a flat tone which just screams "get me out of this costume and get me my check"), cinematography worthy of an old episode of "Fantasy Island," lame ending.If, by some chance, you stumble across a copy of this in an unused corner of your local video rental store, call your local hazardous waste disposal hotline- do not rent it.But do not forget that this horror exists. Some people forgot- and thus "Gigli" was born.