B movie about a woman (Anna May Wong) traveling to a labor camp run by a slimeball (J. Carrol Naish) looking for her father. A remake of the 1933 film White Woman, which I have yet to watch. Let's talk about the cast. We have two future stars in Anthony Quinn and Broderick Crawford. Great character actors J. Carrol Naish, Eric Blore, and Ernest Truex. Then we have cult favorite Anna May Wong, the star of the picture. She's also the only one truly playing to her strengths. The others are fine for the type of movie this is, but I've seen them all do much much better elsewhere. Naish is especially disappointing. He usually brings a touch of sympathetic humanity to all of his performances, even the villains. But here he's all bad with no redeemable traits. Compare this to any number of movies with similar villains played by the likes of Karloff, Lorre, and Atwill and you'll see how generic and uninteresting this performance is. Naish is a legend but this is not one of his best efforts.
Review of Island of Lost Men
