Jane Hoyt arrives in Hong Kong, looking for her husband, thrill-seeking photojournalist Louis. She attracts the eye of shady shipping magnate Hank Lee. With his help, she learns that Louis entered Communist China and was imprisoned as a suspected spy. She decides to arrange his escape. Hank advises her to give up the foolhardy venture, but she refuses. She foolishly meets Fernand Rocha alone and gives him a $500 deposit to set up a rescue, but he merely gambles the money away and locks her up for his lecherous purposes. Word reaches Hank in time to save her. Having fallen in love with Jane and realising that she will not let herself get involved with him while her husband's fate remains uncertain, Hank decides to rescue the man himself. Hong Kong Marine Police Inspector Merryweather is inspecting Hank's junk when Hank decides to make his attempt, and gets shanghaied into helping rescue the husband who is being held in prison in Canton. Louis is freed. Merryweather is forced to help Hank fight off a pursuing Chinese gunboat. When they return safely to Hong Kong, Louis graciously bows out of his wife's life.
The film was based on a novel by Ernest Gann published in October 1954. Gann had lived in Hong Kong in his youth working for a telephone company and always wanted to write a book set there. He moved there in 1953, hired a Chinese junk and researched and wrote the novel. Gann's novel attracted the interest of film studios before it had been published. His novels Island in the Sky and The High and the Mighty had just been filmed with John Wayne and Wayne became interested in purchasing the film rights. However, film rights went to 20th Century Fox, who had a deal with Clark Gable, and Gable asked them to buy the novel as a vehicle for him. Buddy Adler was assigned to produce, Edward Dmyrtryk to direct and Gann to write the script. Susan Hayward signed to play the female lead after Grace Kelly had bowed out. The film was set mostly in Hong Kong and was filmed on location there, but Hayward could not take her children there because she was in the middle of a divorce. She offered to pull out of the film. Instead the film was rewritten and scenes featuring her were filmed in the Hollywood studio backlot. In a few brief outdoor scenes shot at Hong Kong landmarks, a Hayward double with her back to the camera was shown with Gable. The opening and closing credit scenes featuring Gable looking out at the harbor skyline were staged on the Peak Tram. David Niven was going to play the police inspector, but then decided he did not want togo to Hong Kong, so the role was taken by Michael Rennie. The rest of the unit left for Hong Kong in November 1954 for five weeks of location filming. This was the first of four CinemaScope productions filmed by Adler’s units in Asia in the mid-fifties.
