This was Burt Reynold's first leading role and most of his tics and charisma
is already on display - the self-deprecating humor, the coolness, the sexual
appeal to women, the side of his mouth smile not to mention his often unclad
chest. Not that he looked back fondly on this film. He was later to say it
was his worst film. Some of that may have been biased by the fact that he
has to go into the river twice and ended up getting very sick from a parasite
he picked up. I expect he had worse films because I enjoyed this a fair amount
- though for reasons that most might not care about. The story takes place
in Saigon in 1965 just as things are getting very hot. Clearly, they could
not actually shoot the film in Vietnam.
But not too far away is Thailand and nothing could be more obvious that it
was filmed there. The writing is in the Thai alphabet, the language spoken
by the locals is Thai (sawadee) and it is definitely Bangkok. Old Bangkok.
Tons of outside location shooting and it warmed my heart seeing this city
I live in and love from those bygone days. The temples are still recognizable,
the Chao Phraya River is still polluted, but nearly everything else has changed.
No skyscrapers, no skytrain, the tuk tuks were completely different as were
the taxis, boats being propelled by oar, hardly any traffic. A real pleasure
for me to time travel.
About the only thing Vietnamese were the straw conical hats that Vietnamese
wear and the lead actress, Kieu Chinh who was born in Hanoi and was a popular
Vietnamese actress at the time. She later left Vietnam after the North Vietnam
takeover and went to America where she appeared in MASH and Joy Luck Club.
Reynolds claims that the budget was $70,000- maybe - shot in black and white
with a bunch of unknown actors - a fly by night production company - Reynolds
had Gunsmoke under his belt - but it doesn't look cheap, it just looks basic.
Reynolds plays Andrews from the CIA who is assigned to find out why another
CIA agent was assassinated and what he knew. He takes on the cover of an
expert on agriculture to give lectures and fools absolutely nobody. They
are on to him like a leech on your back. His contact is Kim Chinh a supposed
travel agent and amazingly he never beds her. Everyone else is suspect as
the Communists have infiltrated everywhere. Numerous attempts on his life
take place leading to a wonderful 15-minute chase on foot through Bangkok
- down around the docks, through small markets and up the Golden Mount, a
well known temple on a hill smack in the middle of the city. Reynolds shows
some physical chops here early in his own career - clearly doing his own
stunts and falls. So I enjoyed this - probably on par to many TV movies at
the time and Bangkok looked wonderful.
