China Seas
Short description
Captain Alan Gaskell commands a ship on the dangerous route between Hong Kong and Singapore, carrying a secret shipment of British gold. He also has two women aboard: Dolly, a boisterous woman known as China Doll, who is his mistress, and Sybil Barclay, an elegant English widow he once loved. The gold draws the attention of pirates, so Gaskell faces threats both from outside the ship and from tensions among the passengers and crew, while a criminal named Jamesy MacArdle is part of the mix.
China Seas was released in 1935 and directed by Tay Garnett. It was the first of his films in the chronological list that also includes Love Is News, Seven Sinners, The Postman Always Rings Twice and Cause for Alarm! The screenplay is credited to Jules Furthman, James Kevin McGuinness and Monckton Hoffe, and the film was produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer with a budget of one million dollars. Clark Gable plays Gaskell, Jean Harlow plays Dolly, Wallace Beery plays MacArdle, Lewis Stone plays Tom Davids, Rosalind Russell plays Sybil and Dudley Digges plays Dawson, among a credited cast of forty-one. On IMDb the film holds a rating of 6.9 from around 3,300 votes, while on TMDB it has a rating of 6.3 from a much smaller number of votes, indicating a modest but persistent following among viewers decades after its release.
What's left behind the scenes
- Two stuntmen nearly died during filming at the studio when they were washed away by 50 tons of water.
- Jean Harlow (1911-1937) filmed in a wig. Shortly before filming began, she had her hair cut short, but a wig could not be used in the scene where her character gets soaking wet, because it would be noticeable to viewers, so for a few seconds the actress is shown on screen with a shorter haircut and her natural hair color.
- While torturing Clark Gable's (1901-1960) character, the pirates use a device called the "Malay boot." This torture instrument was widely used in the Middle Ages, when the sole of the foot is placed between two metal plates, which move closer and closer together until they finally crush the bones.
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