Shadows of the Orient

Like most videos of older films from Alpha Video, this one is in very rough shape. It's obvious the print has seen much, much better days!

"Shadows of the Orient" is set in the era just after the Johnson-Reed Act (also called 'Immigration Act of 1924' or 'The Oriental Exclusion Act'). This US law created quotas for immigrants that severely limited the number of folks from certain parts of the world--such as Eastern Europe and Asia. However, folks from 'desirable' nations (such as Northern Europe) were given preferential treatment.

Regis Toomey and J. Farrell MacDonald play inspectors working to capture illegal aliens and those profiting from smuggling these folks into the US. Inspector Sullivan (MacDonald), an old an experienced man, is having trouble getting to the bottom of a gang smuggling in Chinese folks. So, Inspector Baxter (Toomey) is brought in--and Sullivan naturally resents it. However, through the course of the film, Baxter proves his worth and, along with his lady friend, is able to put an end to this gang.

While I was uncomfortable with the somewhat xenophobic subject matter, you DO want to see the gang stopped as they are amazingly evil. When they are about to be caught in their airplane, they jettison their cargo--dropping these poor Chinese folks thousands of feet to their deaths!! Nice, huh?! Unfortunately, the film itself just wasn't very good. While Toomey and the rest tried their best, the material was a bit limp and the action scenes pretty bad. For instance, when one plane was shot down, you can see it's from another film as their is a German insignia on the plane that actually crashes! Cheap and silly overall.