Original film title in Malay: Musang Berjanggut
Literal English translation of film title: The Bearded Civet

Directed by P. Ramlee
Written by P. Ramlee
Language: Malay
Starring: P. Ramlee, Saadiah, Ahmad Nisfu
Produced by Malay Film Productions (Shaw Bros.)
Year of release: 1959

Film Locations:
Simple wooden hut
Unidentified beach and coastlines

 

TUN NILA UTAMA IS THE SULTAN’S ADOPTED SON and the crown prince of ancient Pura Chendana. When he has reached an age suitable for marriage, the Sultan urges him to start picking a wife for himself, hinting at him to choose from his ministers’ daughters. Tun Nila Utama rejects them all as he found them indecent. He is then sent away from the palace in search of a woman of his liking. He travels far and wide with a sack of jumbled food ingredients to test the women he comes across, visiting commoners’ wooden huts, traversing into a region where men “anachronistically” wear Western-style collared-shirts, and crossing the seas to discover a group of ladies playing blindfold games on the beach…

 

 

 

Further Reading:
1. ‘Prince finds woman in a thousand’. The Singapore Free Press. 3 August 1959, p. 3.
2. ‘‘Musang Berjanggut’ cherita yang mempunyai sindiran’. Berita Harian. 7 August 1959, p. 7.

Film Images:
© 1959 Malay Film Productions
© 2002 Music Valley