Betrayal from the East

The most surprising thing about Betrayal From The East is that Drew Pearson put his time to it. In post war America Pearson was one of the earliest and most consistent critics of Senator Joseph McCarthy and the brand of right wing conspiracies he was peddling. It shocked me that he would lend his name to this kind of propaganda claptrap.

Lend it he did to this film which has the Japanese contacting former army guy Lee Tracy now a carnival barker to see if he could get the plans for the Panama Canal defense. Presumably Tracy's efforts in foiling the Japanese designs on the canal are the reason it was not a casualty of war.

I'm still trying to figure out why American agent Nancy Kelly who Tracy sees killed in San Francisco winds up in the Canal Zone on another assignment on the same case where Tracy is now. What were the writers thinking with?

The film is a cheap imitation of one of Humphrey Bogart's and John Huston's lesser films Across The Pacific. This makes that one look like Gone With The Wind.

Made at the End of WWII but Set before Pearl Harbor, this B-Movie is one of those Yellow Peril Types that Actually has more Japanese Actors than Americans and They are All Up to No Good. They are Sneaky, Barbarous, and have a lot of Cash to Pay Americans if Only They would Betray Their Country.

Lee Tracy, a Second Rater and Hardly Anything Approaching Handsome is Given the Lead Romantic Role and the Love Angle in this Chock Full of Jap Bashing Film is Anything but Believable.

There are Some Striking Scenes of Torture and Surprising Deaths and the Plot Moves at a Rapid Pace with Hidden Surveillance and a Climactic Fight Scene that is Impressive.

Overall it is Worth a Watch as a Timepiece. It is Bookended with Real Life Journalist Drew Pearson Staring at the Camera and Delivering a "This can never happen again" Warning.

Note...Don't fail to miss the opening Title Card with a drawing of a Sinister Jap with Werewolf fangs.

the first time i saw this movie was when I was about 8 years old and even after all these years i still remembered the movie even though I couldn't at times remember who the stars were and it wasn't until I was looking through an old movie book that had all of the 1940s movies in it did I see a brief review and several pictures of it And found out who the stars were.And quite recently at a movie memorabilia show in NYC I asked about the movie and was able to find out that it was on DVD.But the man didn't have a copy of it but told me would bring it to the next show.And he did and of course I purchased it and watching it again made me recall how good it was.The stars were Lee Tracy,Nancy Kelly,Regis Toomey and my favorite Japanese villain of all time Richard Loo ,If you see it anywhere my advice is pick it-up regardless of the cost.

With World War II approaching, Japan's diplomatic services push a global message of peace but, behind the scenes they plot their attack on the US, using a network of spies and traitors to get information to aid their mission. In America, Japanese secret agent Kato approaches former soldier Eddie Carter to recruit him to report back the details of the Panama Canal. Eddie is down on his luck and working as an announcer in a tacky fair sideshow and he agrees to help them for a big payday. However he quickly has his doubts and finds himself in the position to do the right thing for the US and act as a double agent.

With lots of talk about "Japs" and the title sequence involving a typical "yellow menace" image of a Japanese man it is no surprise that this thriller is very much a simple propaganda film. Presented by newsman Drew Pearson, we are told the story of how "friendly" Japanese in America are really spies, not to be trusted, who use their cunning and sweet talk to win over a typically good American to make him betray his country. Unsurprisingly the drama is as simple as the characters and although it works well enough on the level of an engaging piece of propaganda it doesn't have too much to make it stick in the mind; with perhaps a late scene of steam bath torture being the one exception. It goes where you expect it to and it moves forward without the pace and tension that I would have liked but, like I said, as a simple propaganda thriller it just about does enough.

The cast match this approach by being solid but nothing more. Lee Tracy is a cookie-cutter all-American Joe who does "the right thing" and opens all our eyes to the fact that no Japanese people in America can be trusted. He is OK but I wonder does he regret his role given what happened to Japanese Americans around this period? Kelly is alright and Ahn and Biberman do their usual roles in American films from the time but generally they all turn in the type of solid performances that one would expect to find in this type of thing.

Overall this is an OK but unmemorable thriller that is heavy with propaganda and a sense of fear-driven rabble-rousing. It more or less works as a simple b-movie but it is hard to totally get into it when looking back with hindsight and modern eyes and seeing the clear racism and very broad strokes used to present clean-cut white heroes and smarmy, untrustworthy yellow devils.

When "Betrayal from the East" begins, it claims that the story is based on fact. However, how close it is to the truth is something I have no idea about...and suspect some of this might be overstated a bit due to the common narrative at the time that there were Nazi and Japanese agents all over the place trying to undermine America. Who knows the exact truth?

Eddie (Lee Tracy) is an ex-army soldier who is seen by Japanese agents as possibly being willing to spy for them. He quickly realizes what's happening and pretends to play along with them...and soon seeks out Army Intelligence to alert them about the Japanese plans. They ask him to keep playing along but also advise him that previous folks working for them all ended up dead! But Eddie is a true patriot and is going to see it to the end...especially after the Japanese kill a lady he really liked.

The quality of this film is pretty good and Lee Tracy is also good here....better than he was in most of his later outings following his years at MGM as a star. In particular, I appreciate that although the film was clearly a propaganda picture it was still entertaining and well written...and as a result the Japanese were not the usual sub-human, evil, sniveling sort they were in the more sordid films of the era.