The Second Clark Gable Blogathon – Soldier of Fortune (1955)

This is my first of 2 reviews for the The Second Clark Gable Blogathon 2019 taking place this weekend  and being hosted by Michaela of Love Letters to Old Hollywood

Tnx for letting me partake Michaela!

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“Now that we’ve had our exercise, I suppose it would be presumptuous… to ask whither this slave ship is bound.” – Inspector Merryweather

Number of Times Seen – 1 (12 Jun 2019)

Brief Synopsis – A woman travels to China in order to find her missing husband and enlists the help of an American living in Hong Kong to locate him.

My Take on it – This is a film that I randomly chose to watch and review for this blogathon with the hope that the title would be enough to warrant picking a good film.

The premise presented in this film is actually quite intriguing and it manages to work on most levels.

Clark Gable does a wonderful job in the lead role here and is able to give off a very strong presence for his character even f he might be a bit too old to play such a character.

This film does a nice job showing the way Communism worked in China and how they were able to control so much of the information at the time which forced anyone wanting this information to try and find alternative methods and routes to this information.

The choice to present most of the characters in very ambiguous ways is a great one since it allows the viewer to become more suspicious about everyone since we never truly know who can be trusted and who cannot.

Susan Hayward is fine n this film as the female lead and she and Gable have fine chemistry together as we slowly get to witness the bond that forms between them throughout the course of the film which eventually is quite useful during the later stages of the story.

Bottom Line – Interesting premise that works on most levels. Gable is great in the lead despite the fact that he is a bit too old for such a role.  They do a nice job of showing how the communist forces in China controlled so much at the time and people needed to find alternative ways to get the information about things. Really liked the way that they present most of the characters in very ambiguous ways which helps us be suspicious of everyone since we don’t know who should really be trusted.  Gable and Hayward are fine together especially since we can get to see the bond that forms between them over the course of the film which is able to be very useful later on. Recommended!

MovieRob’s Favorite Trivia – Susan Hayward had hoped to be able to take her twins sons along with her for the location shoot in Hong Kong. Unfortunately, she was in the middle of a very unpleasant divorce from Jess Barker at the time; citing concerns for his sons’ health, he refused to give permission for them to leave the country. Under those circumstances, Hayward declined to go on location: her scenes were all filmed at the Fox studio. (From IMDB)

Rating – Globe Worthy (8/10)

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