Le général est mort à l'aube

As Universal states, in their nicely packaged DVD set entitled "The Gary Cooper Collection" (2005), the celebrated actor is "a mysterious American soldier of fortune determined to foil the ambition of a ruthless enemy general planning to take over the provinces of Northern China. Exotic settings, captivating performances, and extraordinary cinematography power this thrilling tale of courage in the line of fire."

The story isn't as substantive or engaging as the presentation, but quality certainly permeates the production. "The General Died at Dawn" helped Mr. Cooper become Quigley Publications' "World Box Office" male star of 1936. In beautiful form, Madeleine Carroll (as Judy Perrie) certainly helped. Of five "Best Supporting Actor" possibles, Akim Tamiroff (as General Yang) received the "Oscar" nomination.

****** The General Died at Dawn (9/2/36) Lewis Milestone ~ Gary Cooper, Madeleine Carroll, Akim Tamiroff, William Frawley

O'Hara (Gary Cooper) is on a mission to deliver money to Mr Wu (Dudley Digges) so that Mr Wu can buy weapons from Brighton (William Frawley) in his struggle against the Chinese warlord General Yang (Akim Tamiroff). However, he is betrayed by Judy Perrie (Madeleine Carroll) and her father Peter Perrie (Porter Hall) and is captured by Yang on a train. He hands over the money and is taken hostage but escapes and determines to get the money back.......

This film is pretty confusing and you have to pay attention to keep up. It still loses you in parts, though, especially at the beginning. The cast are nothing special and fall in between the extremes of Akim Tamiroff who is excellent as the warlord and William Frawley who is dreadful in every scene that he appears in. Frawley also has an awful, raspy-throat voice which really invades your brain. He manages to produce a very offensive performance and it doesn't help the film at all.

The story confuses at the beginning, then levels out into semi-tedium with unbelievability factor 10. The way in which Cooper breezes through the film with his cocky manner is pure phoniness (he would have been killed at his first meeting with Yang). The plot is also somewhat cheapened by the way that General Yang meets his death. Frawley's involvement in the final denouement is an outrageous con to those who are looking forward to a good climax.

The film is done in such a way as to preach to the viewer and this stand of taking the moral high ground insults the audience...........Shut up, Cooper!!..... There is also some really crass dialogue in the love scenes. Overall, the film is a let-down.

Thanks to the cast of characters in here, led by the wise-cracking Gary Cooper and a pretty Madeline Carroll, this was a pretty interesting film. Some of the minor characters also made this movie to fun, notably Akim Tamiroff's "General Yang," as well as Bill Frawley''s "Brighton;" Porter Hall's "Peter Prrie/Peter Martin" and Dudley Digges' creepy busybody "Mr. Wu."

Nowaday, Digges and Tamiroff's characters would be played by real Asian actors and would be a bit more credible. Also, in a real-life situation, Cooper would have been eliminated early on after the bad guys had gotten his money.

Nevertheless, credibility issues aside (which you have to do in most movies, anyway, old and new), the good dialog, interesting faces, characters and cinematography all make this movie a lot better than I expected.

Between masterworks such as "All Quiet on the Western Front" (1930) and "The Strange Love of Martha Ivers" (1945) the Moldovan born Lewis Milestone had a mixed career. He made a bunch of good movies, a bunch of bad ones, and several bunches of films that have just been forgotten. Somewhere in here we also encounter "The General Died at Dawn" (1936), an interesting adventure film set in China. The film features the first screenplay by Clifford Odets, then one of the hottest playwrights around. Even though the film boasts a charismatic ensemble of actors, it often feels like the real star here is the screenplay.

The movies opens very strong. We are introduced to the plight of the poor Chinese, who struggle against a ruthless warlord General Yang, played by Akim Tamiroff in an Oscar-nominated role. Gary Cooper is our idealist hero, a guy who could never catch an even break, and is now trying to give the Chinese one. Coop is something of a spy, carrying important money shipment to the people fighting Yang, but unfortunately Yang has his own spies and is very much on to him...

I would go as far as to call the first half an hour (or so) of this film a masterpiece. Coop is introduced wonderfully, he has a monkey named Sam as a sidekick, and the whole train sequence, featuring the female lead Madeleine Carroll, and eventually Tamiroff as Yang, is wonderfully written. The suspense of the narrative feels real, but the screenplay also has time to be witty and funny. Cooper gets great lines, and throws a few unexpected (yet so enjoyable) punches around as well. I laughed a bunch and was rooting for the hero, rooting for the film really.

Unfortunately after the first third of the film, the narrative takes several missteps. All the important characters go their different ways for too long of a period, and by the time they are all in the same space again, the film has lost its momentum. The ending is not bad, but it is nothing breathtaking either. The film also runs into some trouble, when it can't quite decide, how it wants to portray General Yang and his men.

Still, I would very much recommend this to fans of classic Hollywood. Cooper gets a really good role as our hero, and Tamiroff is very memorable as Yang. Tamiroff was originally Armenian, so in Hollywood-land, that will have to pass as Chinese. I do, however, seriously wish they hadn't turned poor Dudley Digges into Mr. Wu. That was a bit cringe-worthy.

Did you ever come in late to a movie and miss the beginning? You have to try hard to concentrate and catch up, all the while feeling off-balance and wondering how much you missed. That's the way this picture starts off, and I spent some time trying to 'fit in' to the plot. But this film's plot moves at break-neck speed and made me think it is an editing flaw.

Having recovered, I found the story completely original and refreshing (can't think of too many Chinese Civil War flicks!). I also found a lack of tension - what's the opposite of nerve-wracking? - as there is no sense of urgency to the proceedings. The principals were just fine; Gary Cooper, Madeleine Carroll and Akim Tamiroff, and special mention must be made of Philip Ahn, who was the personification of evil Japanese military in many WWII pictures.

It is worth viewing but is a minor entry in the Gary Cooper canon. I liked it and recommend it but I plan to watch it again soon because I think it is one of those pictures in which some subtlety is overlooked in only one viewing.