False Golden Dragons
A nervous looking businessman arrives in Hong Kong on a 24 hour visa and after reaching his destination by boat, the heat making him sweat as he doesn't take his jacket off; he ends up murdered and thrown from the roof of a tall building by a ninja looking character. Of course the police begin to investigate and naive travelling salesman Bob Mitchell (Robert Cummings) finds himself caught up in the investigation along with sisters Magda (Margaret Lee) and Ingrid (Maria Rohm) which brings them to the attention of the chain smoking Gert (Klaus Kinski) and then the five golden dragons, a gold smuggling ring which inevitably puts their lives in danger.
Well there are some nice scenic shots of Hong Kong in "Five Golden Dragons", there are also a surprising number of well known names and faces and if the scenery isn't your sort of thing then the combination of the attractive Margaret Lee and Maria Rohm might be. But that is really it and I watched "Five Golden Dragons" with no expectations as had been stung before by this sort of weak Far East espionage movie from the 60s. But this time it almost felt like the cast felt the same that they knew they were appearing in a pointless far eastern espionage movie and didn't even try.
As such I guarantee that a week after watching "Five Golden Dragons" about the only thing you will remember is the hysterically bad swimming hat which Maria Rohm wears in an early scene. In fact if you do remember anything else it will probably be Maria Rohm and Margaret Lee who play sisters because everything else about the movie is typical and that means you either forget it or the details end up blurring with other weak movies from the 60s.
I suppose at a push you might remember Robert Cummings performance or Bob as he is cast here because he comes across like he is trying to be a mix of Tony Randall and Jack Lemmon with a constant stream of comedy, from trying to be charming to trying to be accident prone. But compared to the likes of Randall and Lemmon Cummings comes over as annoying more often than not. And as for the rest of the famous names such as Christopher Lee, George Rafter and Dan Duryea they are in blink or you will miss them parts which to me means the producers forked out on some star names to lure audiences in to watch the movie as they knew without them no one would bother.
What this all boils down to is that "Five Golden Dragons" in fairness knows what it wants to be, it wants to be one of those 60s overseas thrillers with a comical central character who is drawn into a story of espionage and intrigue. But that means it is very similar to many other movies and unfortunately lacks anything good to make it memorable although there are a few bad things which might stick in your mind.
