Movie Review: Toll Of The Sea

Toll Of The Sea
1922
Directed by Chester Frankin

There is a legend of
far-away China which
tells of the beauty and
the treachery of the
siren Sea -- whose favors
are a mortgage upon
the soul --

-- who gives gifts of
joy and love, but de-
mands double payment
in disappointment and
loneliness.

Opening text from Toll of the Sea


Toll Of The Sea is Hollywood's first true color film. Released in 1922, it was also Anna May Wong's first staring role. The film catapulted her to stardom in a time when minority leading ladies were rare. Despite her success in Toll Of The Sea, and American citizenship, she often struggled for choice roles and equal pay though out her career because of her ethnicity.

It's somewhat ironic that the biggest break for Anna May Wong can be somewhat credited to racism and exploitation. One of the reasons Toll of the Sea was selected for the first color film was its interracial love story. Executives thought the color process was perfect for the "pale on gold" tones of the story. What's even stranger though, is that after the 1934 anti-miscegenation rules in the Hays Code were enforced, it became forbidden for minorities to a play a love interest opposite someone of a different race. However, these twisty turns in politics and art aren't that surprising. Especially when you consider that Birth Of A Nation was America's first feature length film.

I enjoyed the experience of seeing Toll of the Sea. And I say experience because that's what I consider seeing a silent area film from 1922 in a modern theater with a live pianist, which is what it was for me. Typically silent area actresses do nothing for me. Their acting styles are unique and interesting, but don't usually move me emotionally. Anna May Wong had me in tears. Even though I knew she was destined for heartbreak and death, I cried when she surrendered her child and threw herself into the sea. Afterwards I cursed Hollywood for typecasting her as a dragon lady. Because if someone is going to make me wipe my nose on my sleeve, I want it to be Anna May Wong damn it.

Synopsis:
Lotus Flower finds American Allen Carver washed up on a beach in China. They fall in love and get married. American friends convince Allen not bring her home to the United States. He goes back to America. Lotus Flower waits. Meanwhile, Allen figures he only married Lotus Flower "chinese style" and gets a nice white fiancee named Barbara. However, Barbara insists Allen go back to China to tell Lotus Flower he won't be coming back. Lotus conceals the fact that she has given Allen a son while he was gone. But, then Lotus Flower changes her mind. She tells Barbara about the son. Then tells the son she's not his real mother, gives him to Barbara, then drowns herself.

The moral of the story:
Never fall in love with men who wash up on the beach. It didn't work for Lotus Flower, The Little Mermaid, or my second cousin. So don't think it will work for you. Also that marriages performed in other cultures are apparently inferior to real American marriages. So go ahead and marry that sex worker in Thailand, it doesn't really count!