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Tokyo Joe
1949 Crime / Drama / Thriller / Romance
Review
Tokyo Joe is the second of
Humphrey Bogart’s independent productions after the actor had cut his
moorings with Warner Brothers, the company that made him a star.
It is a ramshackle mixed bag of a film, a somewhat clumsy attempt to
combine elements of Casablanca and the traditional
American film noir crime drama. Although the film is quite well
directed and well photographed, the heavy plot contrivances soon become
wearying and the two-dimensional characterisation does little to
sustain the spectator’s interest. Bogart puts in a respectable
performance, playing the kind of character that he made his own
- a man who is outwardly tough but inwardly very
vulnerable, a man who would risk anything in an attempt to
recapture the smallest fragment of his happier past. Unfortunately, without
matching contributions from his lacklustre co-stars, Bogart’s efforts are pretty much wasted.
The only other character of interest is the gangster boss Kimura, played with the appropriate
note of sinister menace by Sessue Hayakawa, who would later feature in
David Lean’s The Bridge on the River Kwai
(1957).
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Director:
Stuart Heisler
Starring: Humphrey Bogart, Alexander Knox, Florence Marly, Sessue Hayakawa, Jerome Courtland Synopsis
War veteran Joe Barrett returns to Japan after WWII hoping to pick up
the pieces of his shattered life. To his surprise, his gambling
joint is still intact, being run by his old friend and business
partner. Joe can hardly believe his good fortune when he learns
that his wife Trina is still alive and hastens to find her, only to
learn that she has since re-married and has a seven year old
daughter. Joe swears that he will win Trina back, but the
occupying American army is reluctant to let him stay. Tired of
filling in forms for a permit that will extend his stay, Joe decides to
start up a legitimate business, a freight operation financed by Baron
Kimura, the former head of the Japanese secret service. What Joe
does not know is that Kimura has some incriminating knowledge about
Trina’s wartime past and intends to use the freight business to
covertly transport war criminals...
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