Of Love and Desire

Merle Oberon was a great beauty often tabbed the 8th wonder of the World so striking was La Oberon in person and on film. In a career that started in London in the 30's Oberon worked with Laughton, Wayler, Hopkins, Brando, Olivier in a long and great career. A good actress her lavish lifestyle got more attention than her ability as an actress.

Of Love And Desire is a vanity production produced by Oberon's then fabulously wealthy Mexican husband Bruno Paglai, and many of the settings are in the various Mexican homes ( palaces really) that the Paglai's owned in Mexico. A sight to behold is then 53 year old Merle Oberon in a bikini in a scene with an equally daring Steve Cochran also in a bikini who despite the fact that Mr. Paglai was financing this film was said to be Merle's off camera lover as well. No horror roles for Merle like her peers Joan Crawford, and Bette Davis and Ann Sothern, no way! It was glamor all the way with Merle Oberon looking fantastic in this film.

Although you have to be in the right frame of mind to appreciate it. It is an odd, strange, quirky film but I've seen it at least a dozen times if not more and don't tire of it. Ronald Stein's score is terrific, and there was a soundtrack album for this that was fairly faithful to the film's soundtrack. Of course there is more music in the film, but the soundtrack album is worth buying if you like this score (but it is hard to find). This was Merle Oberon's baby, she was behind the production of it and the homes seen in the film were hers.

Merle Oberon's performance is good in this, some scenes are better than others, but she worked hard at finding some nuances. One of my favorite scenes is what I call the "church bells scene" where they profess their love, "for 400 years. At least." This is a well-acted and staged scene with much better dialogue than other parts of the film, as if someone else wrote it (?) I would rate this scene pretty high among other similar movie romance scenes.

Merle Oberon became a legend for her beauty that never faded. She just went one remaining beautiful decade after decade, from the 30s and into the 60s, and somehow, in this film, which she made when she was 52, she is still more beautiful than ever, besides being a very good and perfectly convincing actress. This film is particularly romantic, set in a gorgeously lush Acapulco with some dominating scenes set in her own actual garden, drowning in gorgeous flowers. It's a film of people living in exaggerated opulence, they can do what they want and buy whatever they desire, so Merle Oberon bought this marvellous villa of unlimited space of rooms and floors, where one lover after another leave their bathing suits behind, unintentionally because of refuted love, because she never gets the one she wants, who is a ghost of the past lost in the war, apparently by suicide for having been refuted by her, the first of many. It's a great story of significant psychological interest, since her half brother (Curt Jürgens) is equally passionate but in a different direction, of jealousy for her. In all this the blank businessman and engineer Steve Cochran stumbles in and, like all the others, can't find his way out. The colours and the music add considerable lustre to the film, nothing is wrong, everything is beauty and love and passion, while, as usual, only the passion goes wrong, but things get sorted out.

The only reason to watch this film is to see the timeless beauty of Merle Oberon and Mexico. The price you pay is sitting through this horrible script and seeing the effects of years of alcohol on Steve Cochran and Curt Jergens.

This movie is bad but unfortunately without fun camp moments. It is obvious that Merle Oberon only made this film because offers were drying up. A shame since Oberon is lovely and probably didn't need the Vaseline on the lens treatment.

The film also reels of the double standard. A sexually compulsive man is no big deal but a woman with the same issue is the basis for an entire movie.