Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Hong Kong is the real star of the movie..., January 13, 2007
In search of her missing photographer husband, Jane Hoyt (Susan Hayward) arrives in Hong Kong and learns at the U.S. Consulate that her mission is futile, that neither the United States nor the British government can help her...
She turns in despair to Hank Lee (Clark Gable), an American soldier of fortune who runs a profitable smuggling business on each side of the bamboo curtain...
Hank is attracted to Jane's sultry red-haired beauty... He develops a personal interest in the lady, but when she repulses his advances, he realizes that the only way to win her over is to rescue her husband... Aided by an incorruptible English harbor policeman, Inspector Merryweather (Michael Rennie), he discovers that her husband is being held prisoner near Canton, where he is being brainwashed...
Hank prepares to rescue Hoyt in his powered junk, Chicago, and is annoyed to find Inspector Merryweather aboard... Since the inspector knows the nature of Hank's merchandise, he was held prisoner aboard the sailing vessel... Later, however, when Hank's crewmen desert rather than enter Red China, Merryweather, realizing that this is a rescue mission, offers his help...
Clark Gable was getting a little too old for these kinds of actions, but the film holds attention with its good yarn and its interesting locations...
Hayward looks different without her famous long tresses... This was her second movie with the tall, gaunt Michael Rennie... She had one scene with him in 'Demetrius and the Gladiators.'
Ironically, this anticommunist adventure film was directed by Edward Dmytryk, one of the 'Hollywood Ten.'
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
A slick and enjoyable CinemaScope potboiler, May 16, 2008
Soldier of Fortune is a crowd-pleasing potboiler from the days when Technicolor was glorious (okay, it was shot in De Luxe, but the same principle applies) and CinemaScope really was CINEMA-Scope. There's not much action (the final rescue is laughably easy), but Ernest K. Gann's script is snappy fun, Clark Gable and Susan Hayward play well off each other, Michael Rennie and the colourful supporting cast more than earn their pay, Hong Kong probably never looked better on screen and there's a pleasingly lush romantic score from Hugo Friedhofer. Curious to see director Edward Dmytryk, the one member of the Hollywood Ten to recant (after being appalled at the Party's treatment of his family while he was in prison), turning in such an anti-Communist oater, but he handles it with flair. A deathless classic? Hell, no - but grand entertainment.
As well as a good 2.35:1 transfer there's a good extras package too - audio commentary by Danforth Prince, stills gallery, restoration comparison, the original theatrical trailer and trailers for Gable's The Call of the Wild and The Tall Men.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Soldier of Fortune, July 4, 2008
Excellent movie that deplicts Hong Kong in the 50s and in some ways has not changed from those days. It shows how romatantic HK is and the majestic sights.
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