''China Seas'' is a 1935 American

adventure film An adventure film is a form of adventure fiction, and is a genre of film. Subgenres of adventure films include swashbuckler films, pirate films, and survival films. Adventure films may also be combined with other film genres such as action, ani ...

starring

Clark Gable William Clark Gable (February 1, 1901November 16, 1960) was an American film actor, often referred to as "The King of Hollywood". He had roles in more than 60 motion pictures in multiple genres during a career that lasted 37 years, three decades ...

as a brave sea captain,

Jean Harlow Jean Harlow (born Harlean Harlow Carpenter; March 3, 1911 – June 7, 1937) was an American actress. Known for her portrayal of "bad girl" characters, she was the leading sex symbol of the early 1930s and one of the defining figures of the ...

as his brassy paramour, and

Wallace Beery Wallace Fitzgerald Beery (April 1, 1885 – April 15, 1949) was an American film and stage actor. He is best known for his portrayal of Bill in '' Min and Bill'' (1930) opposite Marie Dressler, as General Director Preysing in '' Grand Hotel'' ( ...

as a suspect character. The oceangoing epic also features Lewis Stone,

Rosalind Russell Catherine Rosalind Russell (June 4, 1907November 28, 1976) was an American actress, comedienne, screenwriter, and singer,Obituary '' Variety'', December 1, 1976, p. 79. known for her role as fast-talking newspaper reporter Hildy Johnson in the H ...

Akim Tamiroff Akim Mikhailovich Tamiroff, russian: Аким Михайлович Тамиров (born Hovakim Tamiryants; October 29, 1899 – September 17, 1972) was an Armenian-American actor of film, stage, and television. One of the premier character ac ...

, and

Hattie McDaniel Hattie McDaniel (June 10, 1893October 26, 1952) was an American actress, singer-songwriter, and comedian. For her role as Mammy in ''Gone with the Wind (film), Gone with the Wind'' (1939), she won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, ...

, while humorist

Robert Benchley Robert Charles Benchley (September 15, 1889 – November 21, 1945) was an American humorist best known for his work as a newspaper columnist and film actor. From his beginnings at '' The Harvard Lampoon'' while attending Harvard University, thr ...

memorably portrays a character reeling drunk from one end of the film to the other. The lavish MGM epic was written by

James Kevin McGuinness James Kevin McGuinness (December 20, 1894 – December 4, 1950) was an American screenwriter and film producer. He wrote for 36 films between 1927 and 1950. He wrote for ''The New Yorker'' magazine. He was born in Ireland and immigrated to N ...

and

Jules Furthman Jules Furthman (March 5, 1888 – September 22, 1966) was an American magazine and newspaper writer before working as a screenwriter. Biography Furthman was born in Chicago. His brother was the writer Charles Furthman. During World War I he w ...

from the 1930 book by

Crosbie Garstin Crosbie Garstin (7 May 1887 – 19 April 1930) was a poet, best-selling novelist and the eldest son of the Newlyn School painter Norman Garstin. He is said to have been "'untameable as a child", and to have "died in mysterious circumstances" aft ...

, and directed by Tay Garnett. This is one of only four sound films with Beery in which he did not receive top billing.

Plot

Alan Gaskell (

) is an abrasive, gambling, captain of a tramp steamer, the "Kin Lung," chugging between

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...

and

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a List of cities in China, city and Special administrative regions of China, special ...

. Tensions are high before the Kin Lung sails from Hong Kong because pirates are discovered disguised as women passengers while others try to smuggle weapons aboard. Dolly Portland (

) is Alan's former girlfriend, who Alan later describes at the Captain's table as a "professional entertainer," and travels with her maid. Meanwhile, another of Alan's former loves, aristocratic Sybil Barclay (

) from

Sussex, England Sussex (), from the Old English (), is a historic county in South East England that was formerly an independent medieval Anglo-Saxon kingdom. It is bounded to the west by Hampshire, north by Surrey, northeast by Kent, south by the English C ...

boards the Kin Lung. "I am in your hands again," Sybil taunts Alan, and eventually they plan to marry when the steamer docks in Singapore. However, Dolly tries to win back Alan. Meanwhile, Jamesy McArdle (

) is a corrupt passenger, in league with a gang of pirates planning to steal the gold shipment of GBP250,000 gold bullion carried on the steamer. Dolly discovers the plot and attempts to warn Capt. Gaskell against McArdle but he deflects her warnings. In calm seas, following a

typhoon A typhoon is a mature tropical cyclone that develops between 180° and 100°E in the Northern Hemisphere. This region is referred to as the Northwestern Pacific Basin, and is the most active tropical cyclone basin on Earth, accounting for a ...

in which the ship suffered damage to its cargo and the deaths of some crew, the Kin Lung is boarded by Malay pirates, as McArdle expected and with whom he is in alliance. The pirates steal personal possessions from passengers. Unable to find gold in the ships strongbox, which Capt. Gaskell has replaced with sand, they torture Capt. Gaskell using a

Malay Boot The term boot refers to a family of instruments of torture and interrogation variously designed to cause crushing injuries to the foot and/or leg. The boot has taken many forms in various places and times. Common varieties include the Spanish ...

but the captain will not reveal the gold's location. Instead, with bravado, Gaskell instructs the pirates, as they prepare to torture him: "My size is 9C", before fainting from pain. While leaving the ship, minus the gold they intended to steal, the pirate's ship is bombed by 3rd officer Davis, who dies while throwing a

Mills Bomb "Mills bomb" is the popular name for a series of British hand grenades which were designed by William Mills. They were the first modern fragmentation grenades used by the British Army and saw widespread use in the First and Second World Wa ...

as a grenade, and later strafed by Capt. Gaskell. Their ship sinks in the China Seas. Frustrated by the failed robbery McArdle commits suicide. When the Kin Lung docks in Singapore, Captain Gaskell, still limping due to his torture, settles that his love for Sybil is superficial. Instead he recognises that Dolly gave him good warning and he loves her more. They decide to marry. He says farewell to Sybil. As the film closes Capt. Gaskell reveals the gold was safe all along, hidden inside the ship's cargo (the toolbox of a steamroller stowed on deck).

Cast

as Captain Alan Gaskell *

as Dolly 'China Doll' Portland *

as Jamesy McArdle * Lewis Stone as Tom Davids *

as Sybil Barclay *

Dudley Digges Sir Dudley Digges (19 May 1583 – 18 March 1639) was an English diplomat and politician who sat in the House of Commons between 1610 and 1629. Digges was also a "Virginia adventurer," an investor who ventured his capital in the Virginia ...

as Dawson *

C. Aubrey Smith Sir Charles Aubrey Smith (21 July 1863 – 20 December 1948) was an English Test cricketer who became a stage and film actor, acquiring a niche as the officer-and-gentleman type, as in the first sound version of ''The Prisoner of Zenda'' (1937) ...

as Sir Guy Wilmerding *

as Charlie McCaleb *

as Paul Romanoff * William Henry as Rockwell * Liev De Maigret as Mrs. Vollberg (credited as Live de Maigret) *

Lilian Bond Lilian Bond (January 18, 1908 – January 25, 1991) was an English-American actress based in the United States. Life and career Bond was born in London and made her first professional stage appearance at the age of 14 in the pantomime ''Dic ...

as Mrs. Timmons (credited as Lillian Bond) *

Edward Brophy Edward Santree Brophy (February 27, 1895 – May 27, 1960) was an American character actor and comedian, as well as an assistant director and second unit director during the 1920s. Small of build, balding, and raucous-voiced, he frequently ...

as Timmons *

Soo Yong Soo Yong, (, originally Young Hee (楊喜); October 31, 1903 – October 29, 1984) was a Chinese-American actress. She acted in twenty-three Hollywood films and numerous television shows, mostly in supporting roles. Among them were '' The Good ...

as Yu-Lan * Carol Ann Beery as Carol Ann *

Ivan Lebedeff Ivan Lebedeff (born Ivan Vasilyevich Lebedev ( rus, Иван Васильевич Лебедев), 18 June 1894 – 31 March 1953) was a Russian film actor, lecturer and writer. He appeared in 66 films between 1926 and 1953. In 1940, his no ...

as Ngah *

as Isabel McCarthy, Dolly's Maid (uncredited) *

Donald Meek Thomas Donald Meek (14 July 1878 – 18 November 1946) was a Scottish-American actor. He first performed publicly at the age of eight and began appearing on Broadway in 1903. Meek is perhaps best known for his roles in the films '' You Can't ...

as Passenger playing chess (uncredited)

Production

Clark Gable & Jean Harlow China Seas Promo Still

Irving Thalberg Irving Grant Thalberg (May 30, 1899 – September 14, 1936) was an American film producer during the early years of motion pictures. He was called "The Boy Wonder" for his youth and ability to select scripts, choose actors, gather productio ...

had worked on the film since 1930 when he assigned three different writers to come up with three different treatments. By 1931 Thalberg had decided on the one storyline and spent the next four years working on a script with two dozen writers, half a dozen dir/and three supervisors. Gable had several temper tantrums on the set, which were tolerated by MGM studio chief

Louis B. Mayer Louis Burt Mayer (; born Lazar Meir; July 12, 1882 or 1884 or 1885 – October 29, 1957) was a Canadian-American film producer and co-founder of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios (MGM) in 1924. Under Mayer's management, MGM became the film industr ...

because the star had recently won an

Academy Award for Best Actor The Academy Award for Best Actor is an award presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS). It is given to an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance in a leading role in a film released that year. The ...

in ''

It Happened One Night ''It Happened One Night'' is a 1934 pre-Code American romantic comedy film with elements of screwball comedy directed and co-produced by Frank Capra, in collaboration with Harry Cohn, in which a pampered socialite ( Claudette Colbert) tr ...

'' (1934) on a loan-out to

Columbia Pictures Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production studio that is a member of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, a division of Sony Pictures Entertainment, which is one of the Big Five studios and a subsidiary of the mu ...

, and he did not want to risk losing him. Mayer even tolerated that Gable risked his life by refusing a

stunt double In filmmaking, a double is a person who substitutes FOR another actor such that the person's face is not shown. There are various terms associated with a double based on the specific body part or ability they serve as a double for, such as stunt ...

in a sequence in which he assisted numerous Chinese extras in roping in a runaway steamroller that crashed up and down the decks of the

cantilever A cantilever is a rigid structural element that extends horizontally and is supported at only one end. Typically it extends from a flat vertical surface such as a wall, to which it must be firmly attached. Like other structural elements, a cant ...

ed studio ship. ''China Seas'' was an early Hollywood formula adventure-movie loosely using the plot of Gable and Harlow's earlier film titled '' Red Dust'' (1932) featuring

Mary Astor Mary Astor (born Lucile Vasconcellos Langhanke; May 3, 1906 – September 25, 1987) was an American actress. Although her career spanned several decades, she may be best remembered for her performance as Brigid O'Shaughnessy in '' The Maltese ...

in Russell's role, which was subsequently remade with Gable,

Ava Gardner Ava Lavinia Gardner (December 24, 1922 – January 25, 1990) was an American actress. She first signed a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1941 and appeared mainly in small roles until she drew critics' attention in 1946 with her perform ...

and

Grace Kelly Grace Patricia Kelly (November 12, 1929 – September 14, 1982) was an American actress who, after starring in several significant films in the early to mid-1950s, became Princess of Monaco by marrying Prince Rainier III in April 1956. Kelly ...

two decades later as '' Mogambo'' (1953). Wallace Beery had worked with both Gable and Harlow in ''

The Secret Six ''The Secret Six'' is a 1931 American pre-Code crime film starring Wallace Beery as "Slaughterhouse Scorpio", a character very loosely based on Al Capone, and featuring Lewis Stone, John Mack Brown, Jean Harlow, Clark Gable, Marjorie Rambeau ...

'' (1931), in which Gable and Harlow had smaller supporting roles and Beery played the lead. Beery and Gable also appeared together later the same year in the naval aviation film titled ''

Hell Divers ''Hell Divers'' is a 1932 American pre-Code black-and-white film from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer starring Wallace Beery and Clark Gable as a pair of competing chief petty officers in early naval aviation. The film, made with the cooperation of the Unite ...

'' (1931), this time with Gable's part almost as large as top-billed star Beery's. The pairing of Gable and Harlow was so popular after '' Red Dust'' (1932) that they wound up making six films together, with the final one being finished posthumously after Harlow's untimely death.

Reception

The film was a big hit earning $1,710,000 in the US and Canada and $1,157,000 elsewhere resulting in profits of $653,000.

References

External links

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China Seas
at malayablackandwhite {{DEFAULTSORT:China Seas (Film) 1935 films 1935 adventure films 1935 romantic drama films American romantic drama films American adventure drama films American black-and-white films Films scored by Herbert Stothart Films based on British novels Films directed by Tay Garnett Films produced by Irving Thalberg Films set in Hong Kong Films set in Singapore Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer films Films with screenplays by Jules Furthman Seafaring films 1930s English-language films 1930s American films