East of Sumatra

East Of Sumatra was one of those potboiler stories that Universal cast Jeff Chandler in while he was under contract there. The story is a romantic pentagon set in the exotic location of an Indonesian jungle with all the men acting with exceedingly high testosterone levels.

John Sutton who is engaged to Marilyn Maxwell without knowing she was once Chandler's girl becomes Chandler's boss on a new job set for one of the thousands of islands in the Indonesian archipelago where the rule of Achmed Sukarno hasn't gotten hold yet. The island is ruled by King Anthony Quinn who has a special girl in Suzan Ball. But Ball is checking out Chandler and the rest of his crew as they start a tin mining operation.

No need to go into all the details, but it all blows up quite nicely with the natives making war against Chandler and his crew with Sutton stupidly bringing Maxwell along into harm's and Jeff's way. It ends in tragedy for one of the five principal cast members.

The film is based on a Louis L'Amour story which since he wrote westerns may have begun as that and Budd Boetticher directed East of Sumatra. Both these guys should have stuck to the American west.

Jeff Chandler always impressed me as having two expressions: one, as one overdue for a visit to the toilet and the other, relief at just having been. This film, which is thin on story, is another tough guy going to tame the wild elements, story. Chandler is at his hammy best, Marilyn Maxwell is always a delight to look at and Tony Quinn plays a Malay chief. This is not the most entertaining film you'll encounter on the late show but it has some pleasant moments about a time when tough guys could wrest fortunes out of the jungle without a worry in the world about pollution, colonial exploitation or globalization, and just making sure, they get the girl.

Western specialists wrote and directed this NON western movie; I speak of Budd Boetticher behind the camera and Louis L'Amour for the story. It is not a western but it could be in the pace and characters depiction, symphony. It is tough, efficient, fast paced, and offering a Jeff Candler in great shape, facing Anthony Quinn, for the first and only time in his career. Yes, good adventure film that proves Boetticher was not only good in westerns. Not big surprises though. So, don't get too much excited, just sit, have a good drink and enjoy. Excellent production design. Very rare gem, strangely, even unavailable on DVD. I took it from a French channel in the eighties.

Duke Mullane (Jeff Chandler), manager of a Malayan tin mine, goes to a little-known island to open a new mine in the jungle. Initially, the natives are friendly, especially dancer Minyora (Suzan Ball), who is soon to be married to local ruler King Kiang (Anthony Quinn). The problem is she's too friendly and comes on strong at poor Duke ( what can a man do!!). He resists as he knows Kiang gets green eyed quick and can get mad ...

A series of unfortunate incidents changes Kiang's attitude to hostility, such as the fire started with Duke's match found nearby. Naturally, Kiang thinks it's Duke's doing, thus Duke is stranded with his crew, Minyora, and his old flame Lory (Marilyn Maxwell), who is engaged to his boss, as Kiang intends to let them starve. He destroys their plane ... things are going to get worse quick ...

Romantic triangles, poisoned darts, an idiotically pompous boss who hates the hero, a jeolous King and a flirty native lady who likes to get the temperatures up! It's all here in this solid adventure yarn that builds its characters and the situation steadily, though it can get talky and nothing really thrilling happens in the first half - in the second half, things pick up in terms of excitement. The blowdart hitting Chandler's men came across painful as the recipient of the sharp little things expressed absolute pain! A little grittiness there. The fight between Chandler and Quinn in the finale is really well-staged and exciting.

It's confession time here on Hot Toasty Rag: When I rented this movie, I misread the title and thought it was called East of Sinatra. Needless to say, I was very excited-and very surprised when there was absolutely no mention of Ol' Blue Eyes throughout the entire movie!

The real plot follows Jeff Chandler to a Malaysian mine as he deals with the natives, who are pretty tame for the most past, two women throwing themselves at him, and a king who's more than willing to cooperate and be his friend. In other words, East of Sumatra is a pretty boring movie. Anthony Quinn plays King Kiang-feel free to roll your eyes as he adds another ethnicity to his roster-and while he extends his arm in friendship, the fly in the ointment is his girlfriend Suzan Ball, who for some reason is more interested in Jeff Chandler than Tony. I know, feel free to roll your eyes again.

Unless you like really cheesy, boring 1950s movies that randomly take place in the jungle in a vain attempt to recapture the thrill of Red Dust, you probably won't like this movie. I'm sure I don't have to tell you how disappointed I was.