TheMovieVampire’s review published on Letterboxd:
I’m never quite sure how much of a big deal Samuel Fuller was in Hollywood as he sometimes really seemed to be making B-movies on the fringe of the industry but other times he really did seem to make fairly sizable films like this one, which was a Cinemascope production notable for being the first major American film to be shot in Japan post-war. Fuller seemed to be really excited to be shooting in Japan, he was after all a reporter originally and he knew a unique opportunity when he saw one. I do wish that he had held out for a better script though because this one felt kind of stock. I also didn’t get too much out of Robert Stack’s performance which seemed pretty “standard issue hard boiled noir guy,” which I’m coming to learn is a harder thing to pull off than I sometimes give people credit for. As for the film’s depiction of Japan… it could have been worse. They do seem to be trying to avoid overly negative depictions though they do fall on stereotypes from time to time and just generally give a pretty surface-level depiction of the country that doesn’t feel as special as the movie thinks it is. The movie looks great though, and there are some reasonably effective kills and set-pieces in the movie. Fuller has made much better movies, but this isn’t a half bad entry in his filmography.