....don't do it! Although, I do get it was done in ignorance on this occasion. Kenneth MacKenna (Burke) did it whilst captaining a submarine and this led to his submarine's destruction with all life on board lost at sea. Apart from his. He stood trial and was sentenced to death for his misdemeanor. His friend and prosecuting judge Charles Gerrard (Weymouth) put the blame on MacKenna as opposed to the woman (?) and this film begins with both MacKenna and Gerrard turning up in Shanghai. MacKenna is supposed to be dead and Gerrard thinks he has seen a ghost. However, before Gerrard can confirm his sighting, MacKenna sets sail on the China Sea on his next mission. However, things don't go well and the submarine sinks. Gerrard turns up in charge of the rescue mission...
Don't be fooled by the title as there are plenty of women in this film, especially in the beginning sections of shore leave in Shanghai. They sing, dance and entertain the sailors for a price. The majority of the film takes place on the submarine after it sinks and the cast have to battle with mental strength, poisonous fumes, a slight case of water ingress given they are at the bottom of the sea and they only have one oxygen tank which can support them for a few hours. They need divers to find them but they also have a torpedo chute which gets used rather ingeniously. They don't all make it.
The film has the added interest of being in that crossover period to sound and so we get speech title cards, occasional dialogue, silent patches and soundtracked scenes. It's a crazy mix, especially those scenes where a character starts speaking, then we get a title card only to return to the character to finish his dialogue with different words to what we have just been reading. It is always the same gist and it doesn't really matter but it is entertaining to watch. The only point which I couldn't get over was the non-sensical devotion that MacKenna has to this duplicitous woman with whom he had a dalliance. His notion of being a gentleman is rather annoying nonsense.
