China-Legionär

Very unusual for me to watch a war movie, but anything directed by Sam Fuller deserves consideration and I was intrigued with the casting that included, Angie Dickinson, Nat King Cole and Lee Van Clef. As it tuned out this was not as bad as it might have been, helped very much by the performances, Fuller achieves from his cast. Set in Vietnam, then Indochina, it features the last days of the French rule, when the Americans were seemingly the good guys dropping food parcels to the indigenous population. Nat King Cole, sings the title track twice and puts in a really convincing performance as one of the French rag bag group who trek through the jungle to carry out their wondrous mission. Mostly filmed on back lots, Fuller has interspersed stock footage to give a reasonable approximation of the location. Angie Dickinson is a real trouper and plays this very wide with much non PC banter with the Chinese, who she seems to keep happy with promise of brandy and sex. Lee Van Clef is a real surprise here (I thought he had always had that weathered look!) and helps to make the last quarter a bit more fun.

On this evidence, Fuller is a strident and uncompromising anti-Communist anti-racist. You heard me. This is a late-50s movie about 'Indochina' - a little ahead of the curve there! - which takes the USA to task for not leaping right in there with their French pals; the enemy has Stalin all over the wall of their lookout posts. So it's more than a little silly, to put it nicely. But given this, the racial issues it confronts are above and beyond the call of duty - the espionage tour our heroes embark on is really an opportunity for dynamite expert Gene Barry to smarten up after abandoning his distinctly Asian-featured kid from his liaison with half-white Lucky Legs (Angie Dickinson). Along the way there are exciting scenes, surprisingly well-modulated performances, and a budget-conscious stylistic trick I've never seen before: shot almost entirely in wide master shot, Fuller constantly pans-and-scans the black-and-white Scope image to approximate camera movement. Here's a guy who's smart enough to know that grainy (not to mention silly) won't matter if the damn thing MOVES.

Angie Dickinson is reputed to have said "I was often a lead actress, but never the lead." Even an idiot will see her to be the lead actor and character in China Gate. She has a better role than Gene Barry by a mile.

I can't claim to have seen a lot of Samuel Fuller directed films--but this is the best I have seen of his to date. The shots with the child at the beginning and the end are very well made. The film may not easily be recognized as a family film but it is essentially one. Is it the only role where Dickinson is on screen as a brunette? Probably so.

The power of Fuller's writing is evident is these lines "Everbody doesn't carry their lives in the face" and "You are tough enough to handle explosives but not handle life."

This is the best rounded performance of two actors--Lee Van Cleef and singer Nat "King" Cole, who actually sings the title song.

Does anybody know the name of the child who plays Angie Dickinson´s son? He is not credited ...... I think the film is not bad at all.... It is the kind of films that Hollywood used to release in those days. Angie Dickinson plays very well her role. The scene she confronts Lee van Cleef without moving a muscle is a very good one.

Nevertheless there arte indeed some scenes very unreal. For example when Nat King Cole steps in that trap (more details shoud be spoiler) there is no way a person could do what he did. But I only wanted to know who the little cute boy is, or was. If anybody knows I´d appretiate......

I remember watching on TV as a teenager, little did I know that a few years later some of the scenes and some of the dangers pictured, one especially, when Goldie (Nate King Cole) stepped on a punji stick, that one day it would it be a real worry.

To this day, I will not watch any Nam war movies, even though China Gate was about the Indochina War with the French I would never watch again, as I said a few scenes would be too much and bring back memories. The reason I posted this was I just watched a short about Nat King Cole and it reminded me of that movie he was in. I had to read what others had posted about China Gate to see if others felt the same way. USMC, Nam, 68-69.