Passport to China

A travel agent, called Don Benton, in Hong Kong gets involved with a disputed plane crash and a secret agent in Canton. This is reasonably entertaining though Richard Basehart is unconvincing as Benton but the film does have Burt Kwouk as his Chinese friend Jimmy, Bernard Cribbins as his Portuguese employee Pereira and Eric Pohlmann as the dubious spy Ivono Kong to provide more thespian entertainment. On the distaff side Athene Seyler is suitably maternal as Mao Tai Tai and Lisa Gastoni is fascinating as the agent Lola Sanchez with her head full of dangerous knowledge. It looks good with plausible settings photographed in glowing Technicolour. It was rather mean for Lola Sanchez to get killed at the end. She was my favourite character.

I sat through Passport to China to support Richard Basehart, but if you're not a fan of his, you should absolutely skip it. It's marketed as his version of James Bond, but it hardly is. Towards the later half of his career, I always feel sorry for him when I watch his theatrical and television movies. He had such a promising start and showed intense dramatic acting chops, but when he made the poor choice of relocating to Italy while he was married to Valentina Cortese, his career took a nosedive and never recovered. This low-budget thriller shows exotic locales and an appalling lack of modern times. In 1960, Caucasian men were made up with fake eyelids to look like Chinese bad guys. It's ridiculous, and it just makes you feel sorry for everyone involved. To watch this movie, you'd never guess the leading actor could once act.

This film has virtually nothing to commend it.The only plus is the colour photography of Hong Kong 60 years ago.The plot is inconsequential,dull and very talky.With ridiculous casting.Athene Sayer as a Chinese woman and Eric Pohlman as a Russian General.The Chinese extras have to crowd around the small backlot,giving a general cheapskate air to the proceedings.

VISA TO CANTON is a middling exotic thriller from Hammer Film Productions, directed by Michael Carreras, one of the leading figures behind the studio but a man whose best work was a producer rather than behind the camera. His output here is leaden at best and saddled with a dull leading man in the form of American import Richard Basehart, who travels into Red China in order to track down a missing man. There's some fun to be had with character stars like Burt Kwouk and Bernard Cribbins, but the thrills are in short supply and you never feel truly invested in the plot. Hammer did much better with their next Chinese production, the thrilling pulp adventure of TERROR OF THE TONGS.

The loud music by Edwin Astley and Cold War politics makes this resemble a Technicolor episode of 'The Saint'; but instead of Roger Moore we get Richard Basehart wandering nonchalantly about in a sharp sixties suit in front of a succession of travelogue views of Hong Kong before heading back to the studio to concentrate thereafter largely on talk... The surprise of seeing Athene Seyler billed second is compounded by discovering her speaking pidgin English as Burt Kwouk's grandmother!

What a deceit. I expected much more. I know that Hammer film was not specialized in war and adventure movies, but they gave us little gems such as Camp on Blood Island, Terror of the Tongs, Yesterday's Enemy, and so on...And Michael Carreras is a good director - and producer - too. I don't understand why he has done such a flat, uninspired, talkative, dull routine drama about help to the refugee from Red China. I almost got asleep. Nevertheless, the photography is pretty effective and the 2.35 format restores some brightness to this tepid story. A tale that we have seen a hundred times before. And often far better than this. Richard Basehart is not enough to save the movie. Sorry... But you can try it. Who knows...