The Sand Pebbles

In 1926 China, a country divided by civil war and foreign interests, engineer Jake Holman is assigned to the USS San Pablo, an American gunboat patrolling the Yangtze River. Holman is a skilled mechanic who would rather work on the engines than get involved in politics or shipboard decisions, but his independent attitude puts him at odds with the vessel's established order and its commander, Captain Collins. The only people he grows close to are Po-han, a Chinese crewman, and the veteran sailor Frenchy Burgoyne.

The film is a drama and war picture directed by Robert Wise, the tenth of the thirteen features he directed, arriving between The Sound of Music and The Andromeda Strain. Robert Anderson wrote the screenplay, and Wise also produced. Steve McQueen plays Jake Holman, with Richard Attenborough, Richard Crenna, Candice Bergen, Mako and Larry Gates in supporting roles, among a credited cast of thirty-two.

Made for a budget of twelve million dollars, the production was shot in Hong Kong, Taiwan and the United States, and it returned roughly thirty million dollars worldwide. On IMDb it holds a rating of 7.5 from about eighteen thousand votes, while on TMDB it stands at 7.2 from just under three hundred votes, a similar figure to the critics' rating of 7.2 from twenty reviews. At close to three and a quarter hours, it is a large-scale historical production.