FILM REVIEWS

In this quintessential Clark Gable/MGM star vehicle, he plays Gerald Meldrick, a suave jewel thief, who encounters his equal in Anya Von Duren (Rosalind Russell), a smooth lady crook, in India.

Both are after the same loot, a diamond pendant owned by the champagne-thirsty Duchess of Beltravers (Jessie Ralph).  He poses as a detective from Lloyds, she as an upper class member.  But when she makes the heist, she is tricked out of it by Meldrick.

As partners fleeing the police, they pose as an eloping couple, take refuge on a tramp freighter but are discovered.  The freighter skipper, Captain Chang (Peter Lorre), exposes them to the police inspector (Matthew Boulton), but they escape again.

Running short of funds in their hide-out, Meldrick conceives a scheme for collecting a bankroll by donning posing as a British captain.  But before he can shed his disguise, he is picked up by army headquarters and sent into the command of a military evacuation detachment.

In a fight with Japanese troops, the false officer distinguishes himself and is decorated with the Victoria Cross before he goes off to serve a prison sentence for his crimes.

The movie, truly an escapist fare, is mildly enjoyable due to the charisma of the two stars.  But the plot is preposterous, and as the Hollywood Reporter noted: “The dialogue affords a measure of smart banter, made smarter by the delivery of Gable and Russell, but whichever one of the writing trio was responsible for those flights of poetic verbiage that are meant to be romantic utterances missed the values a believable love theme might have added to surrounding absurdities.”

Credits

MGM

Produced by Hunt Stromberg.

Directed by Clarence Brown.

Screenplay by Edwin Justus Mayer, Anito Loos and Leon Gordon, based on the story by John Kafka.

Camera: William Daniels.

Art Director: Cedric Gibbons.

Musical score by Herbert Stothart.

Special effects by Warren Newcombe.

Edited by Blanche Sewell.

Release date: June 27, 1941.