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Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves

  • 1943
  • Approved
  • 1h 27m
IMDb RATING
6.3/10
1.5K
YOUR RATING
Turhan Bey, Jon Hall, and Maria Montez in Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves (1943)
AdventureFantasyRomance

A boy prince, raised by forty thieves, takes revenge on the Mongol invaders who murdered his father and stole his kingdom.A boy prince, raised by forty thieves, takes revenge on the Mongol invaders who murdered his father and stole his kingdom.A boy prince, raised by forty thieves, takes revenge on the Mongol invaders who murdered his father and stole his kingdom.

  • Director
    • Arthur Lubin
  • Writer
    • Edmund L. Hartmann
  • Stars
    • Maria Montez
    • Jon Hall
    • Turhan Bey
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • IMDb RATING
    6.3/10
    1.5K
    YOUR RATING
    • Director
      • Arthur Lubin
    • Writer
      • Edmund L. Hartmann
    • Stars
      • Maria Montez
      • Jon Hall
      • Turhan Bey
    • 26User reviews
    • 18Critic reviews
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • Photos27

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    Top cast67

    Edit
    Maria Montez
    Maria Montez
    • Amara
    Jon Hall
    Jon Hall
    • Ali Baba
    Turhan Bey
    Turhan Bey
    • Jamiel
    Andy Devine
    Andy Devine
    • Abdullah
    Kurt Katch
    Kurt Katch
    • Hulagu Khan
    Frank Puglia
    Frank Puglia
    • Prince Cassim
    Fortunio Bonanova
    Fortunio Bonanova
    • Old Baba
    Moroni Olsen
    Moroni Olsen
    • Caliph Hassan
    Ramsay Ames
    Ramsay Ames
    • Nalu
    Chris-Pin Martin
    Chris-Pin Martin
    • Fat Thief
    Scotty Beckett
    Scotty Beckett
    • Ali Baba as a Child
    Yvette Duguay
    Yvette Duguay
    • Amara as a Girl
    Noel Cravat
    Noel Cravat
    • Mongol Captain
    Jimmy Conlin
    Jimmy Conlin
    • Little Thief
    Harry Cording
    Harry Cording
    • Mahmoud
    Ed Agresti
    • Mongol Captain
    • (uncredited)
    Richard Alexander
    Richard Alexander
    • Mongol Guard
    • (uncredited)
    Jerome Andrews
    • Dancer
    • (uncredited)
    • Director
      • Arthur Lubin
    • Writer
      • Edmund L. Hartmann
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

    User reviews26

    6.31.4K
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    Featured reviews

    Cajun-4

    They don't make 'em like this any more.

    I saw this a few days ago after a gap of many years and it's still fun to watch. There was a whole spate of these highly colored Arabian Nights adventures in the 1940's and audiences lapped them up. The fun now is in the apparent seriousness with which they were made and the earnestness of not very good actors and actresses spouting there quasi poetic dialog.

    These films were bonanzas for the exotic looking performers of the period, Turhan Bey, Jon Hall and Maria Montez (one of the lust objects of my adolescence). She would often wear quite revealing see-through dresses and there was always at least one scene where she emerged from a bath or swimming pool, quickly being discretely covered by large towels borne by hand-maidens.

    Extras were cheap in those days and so there is a cast of thousands but most of the time the director does no more than fill the screen with bodies. Look at the battle scenes and you will see most of the participants are just waving their scimitars in the air aimlessly.

    Ali Baba has wicked caliphs and valiant freedom fighters battling it out in the Hollywood desert. The ridiculousness of the All American Andy Devine as an Arab. Fairy tale cardboard castles. All makes for colorful entertainment.

    I give it 8 out 10.
    8skutah

    Entertaining film with some issues that displays a surprising amount of historical knowledge

    This movie is a colourful adventure movie that is greatly entertaining if you like this old technicolor style of Orientalist films. I mainly love it because of two things: fond childhood memories from a time when I even watched it on a black and white TV set in the mid-80s and [name=nm0700084]'s Prince Cassim.

    This actor has played small parts in a couple of classic movies and often appeared alongside some of the big names of his days, but it is in this movie and a couple of later productions mainly that he got a chance to show more of his talent and skills. His expressions and his work with his voice are formidable and he is seriously underrated as his range of characters is pretty impressive. Not to speak about how he managed to make this villain character mean and miserable, contemptible and touching at the same time. His Prince Cassim to me has always been the character with the most depth in this film.

    That said, the film is of course to be classified as strongly Orientalist and escapist, it never lets you forget that you're watching a piece of Hollywood fiction with main characters that are boringly one-sided (good or bad) and it avoids answering the most interesting question: What Ali would've done with Cassim if he had faced the decision as he was the father of Ali's beloved and future wife who - as a good daughter - still had a soft spot for her dad despite his awful misbehaviour. But all of this is part of the style of this sort of movies at the time and therefore I find it excusable.

    On the other hand the interweaving of 13th century history with a tale from the 1001 nights is done in an amazingly apt manner as the fall of Baghdad to the Mongols is in fact attributed to the machinations of a treacherous vizier (along with an incompetent caliph) in some sources, the caliph was actually killed by the Mongols and there was indeed a fugitive who claimed to be a surviving member of the dynasty and subsequently continued the line of the Abbasid caliphs of Baghdad in Egypt. Therefore there might've been more knowledge at work than one would expect from this type of light entertainment and I'm wondering how they came to mix these ingredients with the Ali Baba story.

    All things considered I rate this 8 out of 10 because my 21st century adult self is unable to overlook the issues listed above.
    6ma-cortes

    Classic adaptation of the popular tale in which Ali discovers the magic cave holding the stolen treasure of Baba and his forty thieves

    Technicolor fantasy about an overthrown prince , marvelous maidens , gorgeous princess , several happy-go lucky thieves and many other things . It deals with Ali and a gang of thieves doing battle against Hulagu Khan , leader of Mongols who wants the throne for himself and orders as a hundred citizens shall be tortured to death each day , until the head of the caliph is brought before him . Being children , the prince Ali , son of Caliph (Moroni Olsen) promises eternal love to Amara . But the Mongol Army destroys the city of Baghdad with help of prince Cassin (Frank Puglia) , father of Amara. Then Ali escapes and he shelters in a cave in which thieves hide their loot. A wily young enlist the aid of a band led by Baba (Fortunio Bonanova) and Abdulla (Andy Devine is fun as nursemaid lookalike) to outwit the Grand Mongol (Kurt Katch) and to save Baghdad and its citizens from death and ruin . One time grown-up Ali (John Hall) seeks vengeance and retrieve his lover (Maria Montez of Cobra woman , Arabian nights). Baghdad in the times of the Mongol invasion the Caliph has escaped , Khan orders find him , every day until he dies a hundred of his subjects will be tortured . And so far ten years the Mongols held Baghdad and the people died in agony and only the band of thieves made resistance. A bounty is offered , ten thousand pieces of gold for the body of Ali Baba and the destruction of the band of thieves by order of Hulagu Khan of the Mongols and ruler Baghdad.

    Lavish spectacle and good casting overcomes the somewhat sluggish storytelling that combines a number of familiar ¨one thousand and one nights¨ tales . Technicolor adventure fantasy adorned by beautiful cinematography by Howard Greene and George Robinson , filmed on location in Coral Pink Sand Dunes Road, Kanab, Utah, and Red Rock Canyon State Park - Highway 14, Cantil, California, USA . Striking and evocative musical score by Edward Ward . This Universal spectacle is glamorously directed by Arthur Lubin (Thief of Bagdad , Phantom of Opera , Escapade in Japan, the mule Francis series ). Easy to take , it's a good rendition of this oft-told story
    OldFilmLover

    The Best of the Montez-Hall Movies

    Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves is the best of the Montez-Hall movies, ahead of Arabian Nights, which perhaps deserves an 8, Cobra Woman, which deserves a 7, and White Savage, which deserves only slightly over a 6. My 9 rating is perhaps a bit high -- maybe 8.4-8.6 would be more accurate -- but I give it a 9 in protest against the ridiculously low IMDb average.

    What sets this above all the others is the script; both plot and dialogue are superior. The performances are also livelier, the acting better (both of the leads, Hall and Montez, and of the supporting cast), and the feeling of forward movement in the story much greater.

    In fact, I rank this film third, all-time, among classic adventure films in which only normal human beings with normal human powers are involved (no genies, dragons, gods, animated skeletons, Jedi knights, etc.), and which are not at least part tongue-in-cheek (like the Indiana Jones films). Only The Adventures of Robin Hood and The Mark of Zorro are better in this category. (Though The Black Swan, The Most Dangerous Game and a few others come close.)

    Kurt Katch turns in a great performance as the evil Hulagu Khan. To the 7-to-13-year-olds who crowded the Saturday matinée in 1944, Katch's Khan would be the classic portrayal of the tyrant. Of course, to adult eyes, Katch's performance is over-acted, but films in this genre have to be judged with their intended audience in mind.

    Special mention should go to Turhan Bey, and to Frank Puglia as Montez's sycophantic father. The only performance which could be thought a flaw in the film is that of Andy Devine, as the fat "comedy relief" thief. The "cowboy humour" he brings from his other roles seems a bit out of place in a basically high-toned, medieval-flavoured tale about the Muslim and Mongol Middle East. I could have done without him. Still, he was doing what the part called for, so really any blame should be assigned to the writer and director rather than Devine himself. And again, we have to consider the primary audience for the film (though adults can enjoy it, too) was the kids -- and that sort of comedy relief would be what many 40s kids liked.

    The music, camera work, and Technicolor are all first-rate. The film is polished. When 1940s Universal did one of its rare, big-budget "A"-list movies, it could do it very well.

    Love, courage, nobility; a despicable Oriental tyrant and a people groaning under his heel; the transformation of thieves into patriots; action, glamour, spectacle, and a rousing climax -- this film is a perfect piece of sheer entertainment.

    I watched this movie with my kids over and over again when they were young. They loved it. It's a great family movie if you have pre-teen kids who have not yet been jaded by the modern emphasis on loudness and special effects, and can still accept the older styles of acting and storytelling because they have the openness of childhood. If you start them out on Indiana Jones and Star Wars, it may be impossible for them to go back later and really enjoy these older-style adventure movies. Give them this experience while they can still enjoy it.
    6CinemaSerf

    Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves

    This bright and colourful cannibalisation of several "Arabian Nights" style stories sees Jon Hall play the prince robbed of his birthright by the evil Mongol Khan and his uncle "Prince Cassim", who has fallen in with the 40 Thieves since childhood and is bent on avenging this treachery. Maria Montez provides the glamour (and an accent you could cut with a knife) as the feisty, independently-minded Princess as we embark on some fun adventures. Andy Devine is dreadful as "Abdullah" but Kurt Katch hams up nicely and entertainingly as "The Khan". The film looks great and some of the swashbuckling sword fights well staged, but the acting is wooden, the script more so and the score intrusive (almost as if it were written for a silent film). It's a decent filler performance, but not amongst the best of the genre.

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    Related interests

    Still frame
    Adventure
    Elijah Wood in The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
    Fantasy
    Ingrid Bergman and Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca (1942)
    Romance

    Storyline

    Edit

    Did you know

    Edit
    • Trivia
      The reason the plot of the Arabian Nights tale wasn't used for the movie may have had something to do with the fact that in the original story, there are some 42 murders; the first is Ali Baba's cousin, and the other 41 are those of the 40 thieves themselves and, later, their ringleader, who arrives at Ali Baba's disguised as a merchant and thirsting for revenge. He is the last of the forty thieves to die. The others die when, after smuggling themselves into Ali Baba's house in wine casks, boiling hot water is poured into each of the casks.
    • Goofs
      When the thieves are singing as they return to the cave the camera is leading them. The tire tracks of the camera car are plainly visible in the sand in front of the horse's hooves.
    • Quotes

      Abdullah: For a man's country or his stomach he might bid his life; even for his horse. Never, never for a woman.

    • Connections
      Edited into The Sword of Ali Baba (1965)
    • Soundtracks
      Song of the Forty Thieves
      Lyrics by J. Keirn Brennen

      Music by Edward Ward

      Performed by Universal Studio Chorus

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    Details

    Edit
    • Release date
      • January 14, 1944 (United States)
    • Country of origin
      • United States
    • Language
      • English
    • Also known as
      • Ali Baba und die vierzig Räuber
    • Filming locations
      • Coral Pink Sand Dunes - Sand Dunes Road, Kanab, Utah, USA
    • Production company
      • Universal Pictures
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Tech specs

    Edit
    • Runtime
      • 1h 27m(87 min)
    • Color
      • Color
    • Aspect ratio
      • 1.37 : 1

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