Robert J. Maxwell In 1949, a British destroyer, HMS Amethyst, is proceeding along the Yangtse River in China on a peaceful mission to bring supplies to Nanking. However, a revolution is going on, the Chinese People's Liberation Army ("the Commies") have occupied one side of the river and shore batteries fire without warning on the ship.The Amethyst sustains serious casualties and plows into the mud just out of range of the Chinese guns. Attempts to tow her off fail. Mao Tse Tung's army captures Nanking, so the Amethyst's mission is aborted. And, of course, there are now still more batteries along both shores of the river, blocking the Amethyst from the open sea. The grounded warship is visited by negotiators from the Chinese Liberation People's Republic Communist Marxist Invulnerable Heavenly Army Horde. They're willing to return some prisoners, allow the ship to be provisioned, and then proceed down the river to the sea. The only condition imposed by the humorless Chinese negotiators is that the British sign a statement that the whole affair was their own fault.The captain of the Amethyst has been killed and his executive officer disabled, so they are removed along with the rest of the wounded to a hospital. A new captain arrives. This is Richard Todd. He's fair, stern, competent -- but what to do? Well, let me not spoil the ending by revealing that they slip away virtually unscathed at the last minute.The story is so nicely structured in dramatic terms that it's hard to believe it hews close to history. It opens peacefully, turns at once into a furious battle, followed by a long mid-section involving negotiations between Todd and Akim Tamiroff as the Chinese Negotiator in Chief of the Chinese People's Heavenly Sent Liberation and Degaussing Army and Exalted Perloo Society. Then, when the end finally rolls around, the stress builds as the ship prepares to slip her chains and creep down the river to sanctuary.Very little model work is used. This is to the film's advantage because models, no matter how sizable, are almost always identifiable for what they are. The texture is usually all wrong. Shell splashes send up towers of water with drops the size of basketballs. This movie uses real ships, and British destroyers were beautiful crafts. It's a pleasure to watch them in motion.Acting. Richard Todd is a bit stiff, as usual, but his rigor fits the template of the role perfectly. I mean, what we don't need in this tense war drama is a captain who sits around conducting Gestalt group sessions with the men. Ian Bannen can be seen in a small role. He was to go on to become a marvelous and innovative performer. Also briefly visible is Barry Foster, who was a fanatic IRA man in "Ryan's Daughter" and a sex maniac in Hitchcock's "Frenzy." I was pleased to see that the script made a modest hero of Frenchy, the wireless operator. I was one myself and I can say without fear of contradiction that we are an under-appreciated lot.One performance stands head and shoulders above the others, and that's Akim Tamiroff, a Russian, who essays the role of a gruff and manipulative communist negotiator, as Chinese as a plate of beef Stroganoff. My God, he must have laughed himself to sleep every night! What a ludicrous performance. The make-up alone -- that broad false nose, those pasted-back eyelids. And that semi-Chinese accent imposed on a Russian accent imposed on English dialog. You must hear him try pronouncing "original memorandum" to believe it. The only person who seems able to speak Chinese properly is Keye Luke as the Area Garrison Commander, probably because he was born in Guangzhou, China. When he first boards the frigate, he turns to his aid and says in Mandarin, "You wait here; I'll be back." I was happy to understand it, because it's all I remember after one nightmarish summer of studying Mandarin in New Haven. Sure, Act Two is long and slow, but it's propelled by a good deal of tension, and the heat and boredom suffered by the men provides a neat contrast with the cathartic relief of the final escape. The script doesn't avoid all the clichés ("You mean, you're scared too?") but there aren't many, even though I'm beginning to suspect the musical score was written by Richard Wagner. It's an exciting story nicely transposed into film.

Andy (film-critic) After a week of nearly trudging through this dry wartime drama about the attack on the British naval ship, the Amethyst, I have come to realize that what occurred on this ship – in real life – was probably more entertaining than this. Sure, the ship was grounded, shot upon first, and escaped heroically in the dark, but were 113 minutes without any true character development necessary? The question is posed, not just because of random modern day war stories (character driven, historically inaccurate action films), but because this film itself seemed aggressively made, though poorly created. The premise was convincing. The history was in place. The unknown was defined, yet it seemed to drag from one frame to the next. The intensity of the scenes was too thin, causing an apathetic feeling to befall this group of heroic sailors (from an audience perspective). It wasn't until our third act, when finally something happened, that we were caught back into what these men had to endure. "Yangtze Incident" is a copious war film, demonstrating real ships in action and an unknown "Dr. Who" for the time, but perhaps it was the direction of one Michael Anderson, or my lack of knowledge about this moment in history, but it just felt bland. There was no real thrill or danger in this film, and it distracted from the soul of the situation.What did work in "Yangtze Incident"? For me seeing those ships in acting, watching a slice of another country's involvement in WWII, and the cleverness of the officers to use their minds instead of guns to solve the situations at hand that created a decent film experience. It was when we slipped away from these great points that we lost focus with the film. "Yangtze Incident" wasn't bad, it just wasn't constructed well. When the Amethyst is first attacked, we spend nearly twenty minutes with stock footage with random inserts of the crew reacting to the obvious staged shots. Without warning, the ship is stopped and continued to be fired upon – Anderson, the director, may have been trying to give the audience the same feeling as the crew (the unanswered question as to why this cleared ship was fired upon) – but there wasn't anything connecting the incident to real life. From the opening shots, one knows that this is a film – a recreation of sorts, and the British Hollywood isn't afraid to keep it glossed over. It lacks that reality, or grittiness, that these heroes surely faced while abandoned in the middle of this river. The black and white cinematography does its best for the scenes, but the transfer watched was pathetic. The night scenes were too dark and I finally emerged just as happy to see the sunset as the crew was. Stronger lighting would have helped see that final moment of tension and fear.Both Richard Todd and William Hartnell do as well as possible with the light characters given. Todd keeps a sense of superiority to himself, while Hartnell continues to be the hard-working deckhand with a heart of gold. The scene in which he tries to make the girl smile is both heartwarming and the only chance we get to see the true nature of these men. My final issue with this film is the lack of focus on the heroes. These men did go through quite a bit to bring their boat to safety, and to see many of them regarded as secondary – it just felt shameful. I wanted to know these people, their lives, their histories, their mannerisms – but nothing but cardboard was decided.As historians, this is a film that needs to be watched. As a fan of classic foreign cinema, this was a difficult battle to win (no pun intended). "Yangtze Incident" felt slow, it felt shallow, and it was exciting – boring – and darkly exciting again. There was substance there, but it was unused throughout by both the director and the cinematographer. The horrible acting by Akim Tamiroff as a Chinese colonel was embarrassing. I cannot suggest this film to anyone. It was worth the singular viewing, but aside from that – it brought nothing new than history to the table. This was a film full of potential, lacking vision and dedication.Grade: ** out of *****

JoeytheBrit This veddy British naval adventure is typical of the UK output of the fifties. When we weren't making quaint comedies about drunken Scots or lovable rogues we were supplying the world with copious demonstrations of celluloid stiff-upper-lippery. We were very good at it, and many of those films have rightly attained the status of classics. This one, based on a real incident, doesn't quit achieve that status but it does at times come close. It contains some terrific action sequences, and some stirring final moments thanks to a quite inspirational score, but unfortunately the hour in between runs aground just like the HMS Amethyst.The truth is that once the ship runs aground nothing much happens. The film tries to generate a measure of suspense regarding the fate of a couple of wounded seamen who are ferried to a hospital and wind up in the hands of a dastardly Chinese Colonel (unconvincingly portrayed by Akim Tamiroff) but doesn't really seem to have its heart in it.Most pleasure is to be gained from the performances of such assured old hands as Richard Todd as the gallant Lt Cmdr Kerans, who manages to negotiate the ship's flight to freedom, William Hartnell as the hard-faced but warm-hearted Leading Seaman, Donald Houston as the plucky Lieutenant with a fondness for Horse's Necks (Brandy and ginger ale, apparently), and Sam Kydd as the working class jack tar with a down-to-earth mentality. A young Ian Bannen plays one of the wounded hostages, and a young Bernard Cribbins shouts about fathoms a lot.Probably of more interest to those who were alive when the actual incident took place, this will pass as an adequate time-filler for the rest of us, but little more.

sonnyconsort For the past 50 years the film Yangtze Incident, has demeaned the real and yet unrecognised heroes of the first major incident of conflict from the ending of the second world war. Also regardless of the titles that have been appended to this particular film, the real and original title that was intended for the production; i.e.,(The Sitting Duck)would have been more appropriate were the truth known.Shortly I hope to correct the overall situation on the website; http://www.thehmsconsort.co.uk Sincerely,William Leitch.