A rather tiresome production supposedly set in Malaya after the war, although clearly everything is done on a set with model buildings for longshots and lots of fake jungle plants.
The action scenes are OK, although hardly thrilling. Some things are amateurish. The sounds of machine guns firing was not synchronized with the muzzle flashes in close-ups. Jack Hawkins can throw a grenade at an opponent who is levelling a machine gun at him, and it explodes immediately, saving the hero. A little later, however, when a bad gun sets off a grenade in a tunnel, it doesn't explode for quite some time, long enough for 2-3 people to run down the tunnel and climb a ladder to get out of the way.
As other reviewers have said, the attackers on the outpost are called bandits, but in fact this was a period of communist insurgency. It was an uprising which took the British many years to quell. Generations of colonialism, with the British lording it over the Malayans for generations and looting the country of its rubber and tin, had created deep resentments among Malayans. A portion of the Chinese population was especially involved, as they were supported from China, which had just recently undergone its own communist revolution. None of this background is portrayed in the film, although colonialist attitudes are everywhere, with the colonizers always appearing as superior to the Malayans.
The print that I saw today on TCM was of quite low quality, rather blurry.
I'm sorry I wasted my time with this movie. I have an interest in the history of Malaya/Malaysia and was hoping for something more accurate, more multi-dimensional, and maybe even with a little something for the mind to chew on.
The action scenes are OK, although hardly thrilling. Some things are amateurish. The sounds of machine guns firing was not synchronized with the muzzle flashes in close-ups. Jack Hawkins can throw a grenade at an opponent who is levelling a machine gun at him, and it explodes immediately, saving the hero. A little later, however, when a bad gun sets off a grenade in a tunnel, it doesn't explode for quite some time, long enough for 2-3 people to run down the tunnel and climb a ladder to get out of the way.
As other reviewers have said, the attackers on the outpost are called bandits, but in fact this was a period of communist insurgency. It was an uprising which took the British many years to quell. Generations of colonialism, with the British lording it over the Malayans for generations and looting the country of its rubber and tin, had created deep resentments among Malayans. A portion of the Chinese population was especially involved, as they were supported from China, which had just recently undergone its own communist revolution. None of this background is portrayed in the film, although colonialist attitudes are everywhere, with the colonizers always appearing as superior to the Malayans.
The print that I saw today on TCM was of quite low quality, rather blurry.
I'm sorry I wasted my time with this movie. I have an interest in the history of Malaya/Malaysia and was hoping for something more accurate, more multi-dimensional, and maybe even with a little something for the mind to chew on.