Comment

Mar 18, 2015MICHAEL TAGGART MALONEY rated this title 4.5 out of 5 stars
The 196-minute roadshow cut of The SAND PEBBLES (1966) is a treasure. If you ever want a cure for whatever ails you, try sitting down to a Steve McQueen movie, particularly anything he did from THE CINCINNATI KID (1965) to BULLITT (1968). You'll be treated to a view of American masculinity that is long gone. Athletic, laconic, working class, always butting up against the-powers-that-be, the McQueen take on heroism does not exist anymore. Now we favor super-assassins or comic book superheroes.THE SAND PEBBLES, with its story of a U.S. Navy gunboat patrolling the Yangtze River when the Kuomintang took control of China from the warlords in the 1920s, premiered at a time when LBJ's going-all-in commitment to war in Vietnam was starting to arouse significant domestic opposition. THE SAND PEBBLES, for its time, is a surprisingly provocative anti-imperialist statement from a major Hollywood studio (Twentieth Century Fox). The message? Nations traffic in lies and everyday people -- the sailors, the coolies, the whores, the missionaries -- are merely grist for the mill.