you need more than luck in Shanghai

     In the 1993 Woody Allen film, Manhattan Murder Mystery, two different movies appear -- a brief part of a scene from Double Indemnity toward the beginning of MMM, and a quick clip out of The Lady From Shanghai toward the end.

film facts:

Double Indemnity
1944
film noir
directed by Billy Wilder
co-written by Billy Wilder and Raymond Chandler

based upon a 1943 novel with the same title, written by James M. Cain, (who also wrote the book, The Postman Always Rings Twice)

featured actors:
Fred MacMurray
Barbara Stanwyck
Edward G. Robinson

     Deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the U.S. Library of Congress in 1994, Double Indemnity was selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.

     In 1998, it was ranked No. 38 on the American Film Institute's list of the 100 best American films of all time.

The Lady From Shanghai
1947
film noir
directed by Orson Welles
screenplay by - Orson Welles; William Castle; Charles Lederer;  Fletcher Markle

based upon the novel, If I Die Before I Wake, by Sherwood King

featured actors:
Orson Welles
Rita Hayworth
Everett Sloane

     In 2018, The Lady from Shanghai was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."

extras:

When a person wants to acquaint himself with the work of Orson Welles, two films to start with are

Citizen Kane

and

The Third Man.

      To experience Billy Wilder's work, you can start with two Marilyn Monroe pictures:  The Seven Year Itch, and Some Like It Hot.

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Wikipedia:

     Reviews for The Lady from Shanghai were initially mixed....

     Satyajit Ray called it the first 'atonal' film made in the history of cinema.

     A more recent Time Out Film Guide review states that Welles didn't care to make the narrative seamless:  "the principal pleasure of The Lady from Shanghai is its tongue-in-cheek approach to storytelling."  

One recent book on Film Noir praises the film for its pervasive atmosphere of malaise and its impressive, extraordinary technical mastery.


     Although The Lady From Shanghai was acclaimed in Europe, it was not embraced in the U.S. until several decades later.  Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports an 86% approval from critics, and an average rating of 8.1/10.  

Influential modern critics including David Kehr have subsequently declared it a masterpiece, with Kehr calling it 

"the weirdest great movie ever made."  

In the British Film Institute's 2012 Sight & Sound poll, six critics each ranked it one of the 10 greatest films of all time. ----------------

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      According to Wikipedia, The Lady From Shanghai is referenced in the following works:

a 1973 Bruce Lee film, Enter The Dragon

Once Upon A Time In America (1984)

a 1989 MacGyver episode titled "Brainwashed"

Manhattan Murder Mystery

The Limits of Control, a 2009 Jim Jarmusch film

and 2017's John Wick: Chapter 2, starring Keanu Reeves.

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