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| Mr. Moto | |
|---|---|
 | |
| First appearance | Your Turn, Mr. Moto |
| Last appearance | Stopover: Tokyo |
| Created by | John P. Marquand |
| Portrayed by | Peter Lorre Henry Silva James Monk |
| In-universe information | |
| Gender | Male |
| Occupation | Secret agent spy detective |
| Nationality | Japanese |
Mr. Moto is a fictional Japanese secret agent created by the American authorJohn P. Marquand. He appeared in six novels by Marquand published between 1935 and 1957. Marquand initially created the character for theSaturday Evening Post, which was seeking stories with an Asian hero after the death ofCharlie Chan's creatorEarl Derr Biggers.[citation needed]
In various other media, Mr. Moto has been portrayed as an international detective. These include eight motion pictures starringPeter Lorre between 1937 and 1939, 23 radio shows starringJames Monks broadcast in 1951,[1] a 1965 film starringHenry Silva, and a 2003 comic book produced byMoonstone Books, later reprinted asWelcome Back, Mr. Moto.[2]
In Marquand's novels, the character calls himself I.A. Moto, and some other characters believe this to be a fairly obvious alias, since "moto" is usually the second part of a Japanese surname, as in Hashimoto. Though Mr. Moto is shrewd, tough and ruthless against his enemies, to most people in most situations he appears to be a harmless eccentric who sometimes calls himself stupid. The main characters in the novels are Westerners who encounter Mr. Moto in the course of their adventures in exotic lands and gradually come to realize what a formidable character he is.
In the first five novels, set in the era of expansionist Imperial Japan, Mr. Moto is an agent of the empire. In the final novel, set in the 1950s inside Japan, he is a senior intelligence official in the pro-Western Japanese government.
He is physically described inThink Fast, Mr. Moto:[citation needed]
Mr. Moto was a small man, delicate, almost fragile. … He was dressed formally in a morning coat and striped trousers. His black hair was carefully brushed in the Prussian style. He was smiling, showing a row of shiny gold-filled teeth, and as he smiled he drew in his breath with a polite, soft sibilant sound.
This basic description carries through most of the novels, with a slightly different description inRight You Are, Mr. Moto, set 20 years later than the other novels. In this novel he is described as "middle aged", and his hair as being "grayish and close-clipped." In two novels, Marquand describes Mr. Moto's build as "chunky".[citation needed]
He is often described as wearing formal evening clothes that are impeccably tailored. On occasion his sartorial style is somewhat misguided such as inMr. Moto Is So Sorry when he appears in black-and-white checked sports clothes with green and red golf stockings. When his outfits are commented upon, Mr. Moto makes excuses. InStopover: Tokyo, he is said to have the imposing dignity of hissamurai forebears when dressed in traditional Japanese clothing.[citation needed]
In the prewar novels, Moto speaks a faintly comic English, with elaborate 'Oriental'-style politeness, with misuse of thedefinite and indefinite articles.[citation needed] InStopover: Tokyo, the final novel, he works directly with U.S. intelligence agents and speaks to them in perfect English.
Mr. Moto rarely discusses his personal life but inThink Fast, Mr. Moto he talks about his many talents.
Yes, I can do many, many things. I can mix drinks and wait on table, and I am a very good valet. I can navigate and manage small boats. I have studied at two foreign universities. I also know carpentry and surveying and five Chinese dialects. So very many things come in useful.
InMr. Moto Is So Sorry he states that one of the foreign universities was in America where he studiedanthropology. It is noted in this novel that he has enough knowledge of America to distinguish regional accents.
The novels generally involve a romance between the main character (often a disenfranchised expatriate American) and a mysterious woman. While Mr. Moto often despairs of the hero's attempts at saving the girl, he notes inMr. Moto Is So Sorry that he himself is not immune to their charms.[citation needed]
"So often", he said, "I have seen such gracious ladies disrupt political combinations." He sighed and still stared at the ceiling seemingly lost in memory. "Such a lovely girl in Washington – I was so much younger then. She sold me the navy plans of a submarine. The price was thirty thousand yen. When the blueprints came, they were of a tugboat. Such a lovely lady. Such a lovely lady in Tokyo. She took me to see the goldfish in her garden, and there were the assassins behind the little trees. Not her fault, but theirs that I am still alive – they were such poor shots. I do not understand lovely ladies, but I still trust them sometimes."
While he is a devoted servant of theEmperor, he is often at odds with the Japanese military. He believes in the manifest destiny of the Japanese expansion into China, but unlike the military, wants to achieve this slowly and carefully. Millicent Bell in her biography ofJohn P. Marquand notes how this may have influenced the audience:
There is political significance, too, in the calculated appeal to American readers of the ever resourceful Mr. Moto, the representative of Eastern subtlety combined with Western efficiency, who emerges as a gentleman of wit and charm. This characterization had to survive some anti-Japanese sentiment that followed Japan's invasion of China in 1937. Up to 1939 it may have seemed possible, especially to those Americans unaware of or indifferent to the atrocities of the Japanese military in China, that Japan would be moderate and reasonable in its expansion in the Far East and that the Mr. Motos would defeat the Japanese military fanatics. Pearl Harbor ended American neutrality and American hopes for Japanese moderation, but not before Marquand's Moto series had become one of the most popular fictions ever to be run in an American magazine.[3]
Between 1937 and 1939 eight motion pictures were produced by20th Century Fox starringPeter Lorre as Mr. Kentaro Moto.
Unlike in the novels, Moto is the central character, a detective with Interpol, wears glasses (and has no gold teeth), and is a devout Buddhist (and friendly with the Chinese monarchy). He is impeccably dressed in Western suits. The stories are action-oriented due to Moto's skill withjudo (only hinted at in the novels) and due to his tendency to wear disguises.
In early 1938, there was some press talk that Moto would be turned into a Korean due to controversy over Japanese foreign policy, but this did not happen.[7] By April there was talk the series would soon wind up.[8]
In the filmMr. Moto's Last Warning a list is shown which describes him as:
Throughout the films, other abilities have been noted:
The motion picture Mr. Moto is described as an agent forInterpol.
In the first film,Think Fast, Mr. Moto, he reveals that he is the managing director of the Dai Nippon Trading Company and had decided to investigate the smuggling activities that were harming his business. He claims to be a detective "only as a hobby."[9] In the second film,Thank You, Mr. Moto, the definition of his occupation/hobby begins to get murky. He tells a woman that he is an importer whose hobby is detective work, but only after showing her his identification which indicates he is a Confidential Agent for the International Association of Importers. However, in a climactic chase sequence he flashes a badge at a guard and says that he is from the International Police (understood as Interpol).
In subsequent films Mr. Moto works for private organizations such as the Diamond Syndicate (Danger Island) as well as for world governments (Mr. Moto's Last Warning andMr. Moto Takes a Chance)-- but only when it is in Japan's interests.
As a member of the International Police, he garners respect from local police around the world. In London,Shanghai, and San Francisco he is given full cooperation for his investigations. InMr. Moto's Last Warning he works side by side withBritish Secret Service agents and inMr. Moto Takes a Chance he is spying for an unknown government agency. He is known for his close relationship to the Chinese Royal Family.
Mr. Moto's personal life is rarely touched upon. InThink Fast, Mr. Moto he tells Bob Hitchings that he went toStanford University, graduating in 1921 as an honorary member. There, he set a pole vaulting record and was a member of the fraternity Alpha Omega.
In the movies, Mr. Moto travels a great deal and manages to have his cat, Chunkina, along for the journey. Besides his cat, the women in his life include Lela Liu (played byLotus Long in the filmThink Fast, Mr. Moto), a hotel telephone operator whom he asks out on a date, and who proves to be an agent who helps him in his investigation. InMysterious Mr. Moto, an agent, Lotus Liu (also played by Lotus Long, credited as Karen Sorrell), pretends to fall for his charms so they can be alone to compare notes in their investigation. Like his literary counterpart, Kentaro Moto believes that a "Beautiful girl is only confusing to a man",[9] but has been known to use a woman's emotions to aid his cause. InThank You, Mr. Moto, he tells the disillusioned Madame Tchernov, "I am so grateful for your suspicious nature. It is not the first time a woman's jealousy has been fatal to the man she loved."[10]
Mr. Moto is charming and polite (even to rude or obnoxious people). He is respectful of other cultures, but sometimes makes wry comments. For instance, inThink Fast, Mr. Moto, he derails the drunken American's party tricks with a little judo. After putting the tipsy Bob Hitchings to bed, he sadly shakes his head and says, "Strange people these Americans."[9]
Mr. Moto's religion is never stated; but inThank You, Mr. Moto, when his friend Prince Chung (played by Phillip Ahn) dies, it becomes clear Mr. Moto is a devout Buddhist, as he chants expertly before the statue of theBuddha while holding the prince in his arms.
The family crest ormon on Mr. Moto'syukata, as seen in the filmsThank You, Mr. Moto andMr. Moto Takes a Vacation, is three bars in a circle. This is similar to the Maruno uchini mitsuhikiryō (丸の内に三引両),[11] themon of theSakuma clan who served underOda Nobunaga.[12] This would imply that Moto is from asamurai family.
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A film version ofStopover Tokyo, made in 1957, starsRobert Wagner as an American spy. This film eliminated Moto's character altogether. It disregards the plot of Marquand's novel, and was not a commercial or critical success.
In 1965 Mr. Moto's character was revived in a low-budgetRobert Lippert production filmed in England starringHenry Silva. InMr. Moto Returns, a.k.a.The Return of Mr. Moto, Mr. I.A. Moto is a member ofInterpol. The very tall Silva conveyed an almostJames Bond-like playboy character; in the fight scenes it is obvious[citation needed] that he is not proficient in martial arts. He speaks in a lazy 'Beatnik' manner. Nowhere in the film is it mentioned that Moto is Japanese. He is referred to as an "Oriental" and, oddly, in the trailer, Moto is referred to as a "swinging Chinese cat". It is only when disguised as a Japanese oil representative, Mr. Takura, that a stereotypical portrayal of a Japanese businessman is given.
| Title | Star | Director | Released | Plot | Notes | Distributor |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Think Fast, Mr. Moto | Peter Lorre | Norman Foster | 1937 | Mr. Moto works to stop a secret smuggling operation.[13] | Based on Marquand's novel of the same name.[14] | 20th Century Fox |
| Thank You, Mr. Moto | In disguise again as a Mongolian trader in theGobi desert, Moto makes his way toPeking where he tries to obtain ancient scrolls that lead the way to the treasure ofGenghis Khan. At the end, he fulfills an obligation to his dying friend and destroys the scrolls so no one can ever violate the treasure. | Marquand wrote the screenplay, loosely based on hisnovel of the same name. | ||||
| Mr. Moto's Gamble(akaMr. Moto's Diary) | James Tinling | 1938 | Moto is now famous enough as a detective to be giving a class in criminology in San Francisco. While at a boxing match, Moto is drawn into a murder investigation. | Originally intended for theCharlie Chan series starringWarner Oland; re-written to make it a Moto film, butKeye Luke, as Chan's son Lee, remained. | ||
| Mr. Moto Takes a Chance | Norman Foster | Undercover as an archeologist inThailand, Moto is trying to learn who is heading a revolutionary army smuggling guns and explosives into the tiny village of Tong Moi. | Original story. | |||
| Mysterious Mr. Moto | Posing as a Japanese murderer, Moto escapes fromDevil's Island with a member of the League of Assassins to find out not only who is their next victim but to identify the mysterious man at the top. | |||||
| Mr. Moto's Last Warning | 1939 | InPort Said,Egypt, Moto tries to stop the French Naval Fleet from being destroyed by secret agents bent on starting a war between the British and the French. | ||||
| Mr. Moto in Danger Island | Herbert I. Leeds | Diamond smugglers are working out ofPuerto Rico and Moto is sent to investigate and discover their secret lair. | Based on the novelMurder in Trinidad byJohn W. Vandercook | |||
| Mr. Moto Takes a Vacation | Norman Foster | While pretending to be vacationing in San Francisco, Moto is actually keeping an eye on the crown of theQueen of Sheba, surefire bait for the master thief known as Metaxa. | Original story. | |||
| The Return of Mr. Moto | Henry Silva | Ernest Morris | 1965 | Moto leaves his Hawaiian home to solve a case in London involving an ex-Nazi.[15] |
From May to October 1951, theNBC Radio Network produced and aired 23 half-hour episodes starringJames Monks as Mr. I.A. Moto, international secret agent. Mr. Moto is an American of Japanese descent born in San Francisco but retaining his international connections.[16]
The show focused on Mr. Moto's fight against Communism although occasionally he solved more mundane mysteries such as murder and blackmail.
Peter Lorre brought the character of Mr. Moto to many comedy radio programs.[18]
The slangy and whimsical song "Java Jive", a 1940 song byMilton Drake andBen Oakland that was a standard for theInk Spots,namechecks the detective in a nonsensical couplet: "I love java, sweet and hot / Whoops Mister Moto, I'm a coffee pot".
The Bel-Airs, an early and influentialsurf rock band, are best known for their 1961 instrumental hit "Mr. Moto".
The character ofJoe Jitsu fromThe Dick Tracy Show was based on Mr. Moto.[citation needed]
