From the 1940s to the 1980s, Victor Mature was a lone wolf leading man cutting a suave figure through high and low movies.  China Doll was done at his midpoint of his career.  This movie, done in B/W, is set in WW2, yet produced in 1958.  It is a love story set war, and very little war to be seen, till the end.  Mature plays a pilot flying the Hump, shipping war materials around Asia facing danger within a  cultural circus.  He unknowingly picks up a house maid who falls in love with her.

Lots of cultural bridges must have crossed in making the film. Interracial couples were not exactly smiled upon back in 58′.  The movie even managed to take a swipe at “the commies” at the touching end of the movie.  I give credit to the makers as not many movies cover the Hump story.  An aging Ward Bond plays the practical (Chinese speaking) American priest.  There is also a wisecracking little Chinese kid in the mold of Shortround from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.

This is a fun, historical love story.  You will not soon forget Mature’s eyebrows.  They are big enough to hide the Nationalist Chinese Air Force under.