Suez

1938
Approved
1h 44m

IMDb RATING

YOUR RATING

Tyrone Power, Annabella, and Loretta Young in Suez (1938)

Ferdinand de Lesseps, disappointed in love, is sent as a junior diplomat to the Isthmus of Suez, and realizes it's just the place for a canal.Ferdinand de Lesseps, disappointed in love, is sent as a junior diplomat to the Isthmus of Suez, and realizes it's just the place for a canal.Ferdinand de Lesseps, disappointed in love, is sent as a junior diplomat to the Isthmus of Suez, and realizes it's just the place for a canal.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

6.6/10

935

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

Nominated for 3 Oscars
- 3 nominations total

Photos28

+ 20

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Storyline

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Did you know

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Trivia
In an interview in the late 1970s, director Allan Dwan talked of the censorship battle he had with the Hays Office over the wet-shirt scene, in which Annabella's erect nipples are on prominent display. "I wanted them to show," he said. His argument with the Hays Office was, "Have you ever seen a nude woman? Ever seen your wife nude? There was nothing there that wasn't positively true to life . . . you knew she was going to be sexy . . . that's why you picked her. The audience knows. This is my idea of giving it to them. All women are alike--they can go to the mirror and see that anytime." The matter was dropped, as re-shooting the scene would have cost too much because the studio would have had to rebuild the entire set. Dwan said that his nemesis, studio boss Darryl F. Zanuck, was pleased with the picture.

Quotes
Benjamin Disraeli: [to the House of Commons] By all means support this policy; by all means rally round the Prime Minister; by all means follow cheerfully and unquestioningly his leadership. All of you... who are as anxious as he to see England reduced to the standing of a third-rate power!

Connections
Featured in Ty & Loretta: Sweethearts of the Silver Screen (2008)

Soundtracks
La Marseillaise
(1792) (uncredited)
Music by Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle
In the score often and extensively during the riot scenes

User reviews17

Review

Featured review

7/10

A prestige production that is surprisingly entertaining.

In "Suez" a lot of Americans pretend to be a lot of Frenchmen, or maybe just plain old 'foreigners', as they often did on the big screen. This 1938 20th Century Fox picture might qualify as an epic; it's certainly a very handsome, prestige production directed by Allan Dwan with Darryl F. Zanuck producing. As you may or may not guess from the title it's the story of how the Suez Canal came into being with Tyrone Power as Ferdinand de Lesseps, the man who came up with the idea of a passage to link the seas of the East with the Mediterranean.

The large cast also includes Loretta Young as the Empress Eugenie, Leon Ames as Napoleon III and such stalwarts as Joseph Schildkraut, Henry Stephenson, Sig Ruman, Nigel Bruce and George Zucco. For a touch of authenticity the French actress Annabella was cast as the French girl Ty falls for out in Egypt. The Egyptian 'locations' were mostly shot in Arizona and California but an excessive use of sand helps us suspend our disbelief. It's also surprisingly entertaining and Power was as handsome here as he ever was on screen. A swan-necked Loretta Young also manages to live up to her given title as 'the most beautiful woman in Europe'. A huge hit in its day and a great way to pass a dull Saturday afternoon.