Main Cast: Gary Cooper, Madeleine Carroll, Akim Tamiroff, Dudley Digges, Porter Hall
Release Year: 1936
Country: US
Run Time: 93 minutes
Plot
General Yang (Akim Tamiroff) is a politically ambitious Chinese bandit who holds the Northern districts in a grip of terror. Yang is opposed by O'Hara (Gary Cooper), an American mercenary who fights on behalf of the peasants. When he is entrusted with a large sum of money to buy guns, O'Hara becomes the target of Yang and his minions. Betrayed by a cowardly Caucasian (Porter Hall), O'Hara nonetheless falls in love with his betrayer's daughter Judy (Madeline Carroll). Yang captures both O'Hara and Judy and spirits them away on his junk, where the General intends to torture O'Hara so as to find out where the money is. A bizarre and gloomy ending caps this atmospheric thriller, adapted from Charles G. Booth's best-selling novel by Clifford Odets--who, along with director Lewis Milestone, novelist John O'Hara and Hollywood columnist Sidney Skolsky, appears as an extra in one scene. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
William Frawley - Brighton; J.M. Kerrigan - Leach; Philip Ahn - Oxford; Lee Tung Foo - Mr. Chen; Leonid Kinskey - Stewart; John O'Hara - Reporter; George Chan - Porter; Spencer Chan - Killer; Val Duran - Wong; Sarah Edwards - American Couple; Willie Fung - Bartender; Hans Furberg - Yang's Military Advisor; Paul Harvey - American Couple; Barnett Parker - Englishman; Sidney Skolsky; Kam Tong - House Boy; Hans Von Morhart - Mandarin; Walter Wong - Bartender; Richard Young; Lewis Milestone - Reporter; Harry Yip; Frank Young - Clerk; Leo Abbey
Credit
Hans Dreier - Art Director, Ernst Fegte - Art Director, Travis Banton - Costume Designer, Lewis Milestone - Director, Edna Warren - Editor, Werner Janssen - Composer (Music Score), Boris Morros - Musical Direction/Supervision, Victor Milner - Cinematographer, William Le Baron - Producer, Gordon Jennings - Special Effects, Arthur Smith - Special Effects, Clifford Odets - Screenwriter, Charles G. Booth - Book Author
The movie was nominated for Academy Awards for Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Akim Tamiroff), Best Cinematography and Best Music, Score. There are several scenes in the film that show startling originality at the time. At one point, the camera focuses on a white door knob, and then dissolves to a white billiard ball to connect disparate scenes. In another scene, two characters have a conversation in which they speculate about the fates of other characters in the drama. The answers to their questions appear in screen segments in the corners of the screen, marking an unusual use of split screen to join narrative.
The main character, O'Hara, is based on the real-life Anglo-Canadian Jewish adventurer Morris Abraham "Two-Gun" Cohen. During the early 1930s, Cohen ran guns for various warlords in mainland China.
In 1938 an animated spoof version, called The Major Lied Till Dawn, was produced by Leon Schlesinger Productions. Also, a third-season episode of the TV show, M*A*S*H was entitled "The General Flipped at Dawn" (broadcast 9/10/74). In the episode, Harry Morgan appears as Major General Bartford Hamilton Steele, a batty General who is convinced that the 4077th needs to move closer to the front lines, to be near the action. [Morgan joined the cast of M*A*S*H in Season Four as the much-saner Colonel Sherman T. Potter.]
