The General Died at Dawn

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05/22/2022 Now I know why this movie died, too!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! See more 12/20/2021 The General Died at Dawn, the title itself is enough of a giveaway as to what happens. But the circumstances leading up to the death of Chinese Warlord Akim Tamiroff is quite a tale. The setting for this film is Kuomintang China where the government of Chiang Kai-Shek doesn't have its writ run very far. Most of China in the Twenties is controlled by various provincial warlords. In fact a case could be made that the Chinese Communists under Mao Tse-tung was viewed as just another warlord. But that's a whole different story. American adventurer Gary Cooper has a money belt with a whole lot of cash in it entrusted to him by the opposition faction to Akim Tamiroff. He's supposed to make contact with William Frawley in Shanghai who when he's not drinking the hotel bar dry, runs guns. But Madeleine Carroll and her father Porter Hall who are working for Tamiroff help Tamiroff part Cooper from his money. In the case of Coop, he's real guilty of thinking with his gonads. Then Porter Hall steals the money for himself and the film gets real interesting. There's one big flaw in the film, occurring when Madeleine Carroll who starts falling for Cooper, refers to him as the "O'Hara Boy." O'Hara is Cooper's character name. Coop was 35 when this film was made and referring to him as 'boy' was ludicrous. But then again a man of 35 should have been on better guard. Film might have worked better if someone younger like Robert Taylor or Tyrone Power played the part of O'Hara. Or Clifford Odets's script should have given Carroll a more elaborate ruse to play on Cooper. Two major oriental roles were given to occidental players. Casting like Akim Tamiroff as the warlord Yang and Dudley Digges as Mr. Wu who employs Cooper would never happen today. But both do well and come to think of it Tamiroff does have an oriental strain in his ancestry. One bit of casting really hits home. By all accounts William Frawley was hardly the lovable tightwad Fred Mertz in real life. He was a misanthropic alcoholic in the tradition of W.C.Fields and a mean drunk when he was loaded which was often back then. His role as Brighton, the misanthropic, mean, and thoroughly racist gunrunner was way closer to the real Bill Frawley. Gary Cooper in The General Died at Dawn was playing a role that Humphrey Bogart would probably have done in the forties. It was always joked that Cooper's dialog consisted of 'yup' and 'nope.' But the way he gets himself, Carroll and Digges out of a real predicament in the end called for quite a gift of gab. See more steve d 07/23/2020 The acting is great but the story frustrating. See more 03/25/2014 i liked to opening sequence of this action yarn it was very neat cooper once again plays the heroic figure this time in war torn China. this reminded me of 'the bitter tea of general yen" w/o katerine hepburn! See more 06/11/2010 Okay film by Lewis Milestone that had a ton of potential but unfortunately didn't really work for me. Gary Cooper stars as an American in China who is trying to help smuggle weapons to the helpess Chinese to defend themselves against the evil warlord Akim Tamiroff. While I hate all of these remakes that are going on right now, I feel a remake of this film, if in the right hands, would be excellent. I guess the problem with this is that it went by too quickly, some characters showed up without much explanation and others sort of disappeared. It's got a nice score and the setting is excellent, but this could have been so much better. See more 03/06/2010 Melodrama. But entertaining melodrama. See more Read all reviews

The General Died at Dawn

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