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Director Robert Aldrich, one year before his post-modern Noir masterpiece Kiss Me, Deadly (1955), did his best with this atmospheric China Seas melodrama. Should chanteuse Frenesie (Marion Carr) stay glued to her weak-kneed but handsome husband (Patric Knowles) or wise up and take what tough but reliable Irish soldier of fortune Callahan (Dan Duryea) has to offer? The answer comes only after sterling character actors Gene Lockhart (evil mastermind), Nigel Bruce (colonial governor), Douglas Dumbrille (military cop) and once-handsome Reginald Denny (ditto) squabble and planify to restore order. Bonus: lovely brogue-wielding Arthur Shields, younger brother of icon Barry Fitzgerald, as the hydrogen bomb expert whose kidnap fuels the intrigue. Bad guys vs. good with the sublime, sweet-hearted, tough-tongued Duryea playing both ends against the middle. His face like carved rare roast beef, his hair slicked back, eternal glint in his eye, Duryea wriggles through sewers, sprints around enemy strongholds, and handles grenades with the best of em.
Made by the same production set-up on the same lot that was producing the 1953-54 "China Smith/Captain China" TV series that starred Dan Duryea as soldier-of-fortune China Smith, using many of the same players that were regulars on the TV series, including Douglass Dumbrille, as head of the British Intelligence, and the same "Singapore", British Colony colonials and China sets used on the series. In this instance, they had the good grace to actually make a "new" film rather than just paste two of the TV episodes together and sending it out as a "new" movie as many of the TV production companies were doing at the time, i.e., the producers of the "Ramar of the Jungle" and Guy Madisons "Wild Bill Hickok" series. And changed the role names of Duryea and Dumbrille, but the Duryea character is still "China Smith." And hired a good director. This time out China Smith...uh.....Mike Callahan (Dan Duryea), because of his friendship with Julian March (Patric Knowles),becomes involved with a plot to kidnap a nuclear scientist who is one of the three men in the whole wide world who knows how to detonate an H-Bomb and evidently carries most of the makings around with him. March is in league with Alexis Pederas (Gene Lockhart, less lovable than usual)and his henchman Guzik (former boxer Lou Nova and mean as usual), planning to do some blackmailing on a global scale. Lots of killing, kidnappings, crosses and double-crosses, fights and pursuits follow, plus some bit of footsie between Marchs wife, Frennessy (Marian Carr) and Callahan. Nothing much happens in that area either as she departs Singapore and Callahan both when neither are of further use to her. Better than the TV series because of director Robert Aldrich. And Marian Carr, who Aldrich would use later on.
Dan Duryea
Mike Callahan
Gene Lockhart
Alexis Pederas
Patric Knowles
Julian March
Reginald Denny
Maj. Ian Bone
Nigel Bruce
Gov. Sir Charles Coutts
Marian Carr
Frennessey March
Arthur Shields
Sean O'Connor
Douglass Dumbrille
Insp. McCollum
Carmen D'Antonio
Dancer
Keye Luke
Wong
Clarence Lung
Johnny Chan
Lou Nova
Guzik
Patrick Allen
Soldier
Spencer Chan
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Herschel Graham
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Stuart Hall
Military Officer
George Hoagland
Soldier
Gustave Lax
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