Victor Mature

In China, in 1943, after the Japanese have cut off supply lines and American pilots are ferrying food, medical supplies and refugees, Capt. Cliff Brandon (Victor Mature) lands at the American air base in Kunming after a flight from India. Cliff, who has been saddled with an inexperienced crew, has become demoralized and morose as a result of his war experiences and spends most of his free time drinking in Sadie's Place, a local bar where he is often propositioned by young women. One night, Cliff leaves the bar in a drunken state and encounters an old man (W.T. Chang) in the street, who offers him the company of a young woman. Unable to communicate with the old man, Cliff wakes up the next morning to find that the girl, Shu-Jen (Li Hua Li), has followed him home and intends to stay. Father Cairns (Ward Bond), a priest who operates St. Joseph's Mission, visits Cliff for coffee, and Cliff quickly explains the misunderstanding about the girl, then orders Ellington (Danny Chang), a young Chinese boy who spends time at the airfield, to get rid of her. Later, after Cairns finds Shu-Jen outside Sadie's expecting to get a job as a "hostess," he takes her with him to the mission. When Cliff visits Cairns for a game of chess, the priest explains that Shu-Jen is one of 11 children, three of whom have died, and that Cliff, in his drunken state, agreed to hire her as a bonded servant for three months. Cairns adds that pride decrees that she act as his housekeeper and that the money will certainly help her family. Initially, Cliff refuses, but relents and takes Shu-Jen to Alice Nichols (Elaine Devry), an American Red Cross canteen worker, to find clean clothes for her. Meanwhile, Dan O'Neill (Stuart Whitman), one of Cliff's crew, is romancing Mona Perkins (Ann McCrea), another Red Cross volunteer. At his home, Cliff instructs Ellington to tell Shu-Jen that she is to be only his housekeeper, then asks the boy to stay with him as house guest and chaperon. After Col. Wiley (Denver Pyle) assigns Cliff to fly refugees to Calcutta, he returns with medical supplies for Cairns and a small brooch for Shu-Jen. However, Cliff has a malaria attack and, delirious, allows Shu-Jen to lie beside him for comfort. Cliff recovers, but goes to tell Cairns that "something happened" and that Shu-Jen should go home. Upon discovering that Shu-Jen is pregnant, Alice, a war widow who has become romantically involved with crew member Phil Gates (Bob Mathias), tells Cliff that he has neither honor, nor decency. When Cliff returns home, he finds that Shu-Jen has just left for her home. Cliff drives after her, finds her and tells her that, although it has taken him a while to realize it, he is in love with her. However, when Cliff enlists Ellington's help in formally proposing marriage, Shu-Jen declines, fearful that their marriage will create problems for him. With Cairns's help, Cliff finally convinces Shu-Jen, and they are married in a traditional Chinese ceremony. At the ceremony, Wiley tells Cliff and his crew that they have to leave the next day to fly out of a different base. Later, Cliff, now a changed man, receives word that Shu-Jen has had a baby girl and a few weeks later, when Alice and Mona are reassigned to the same base, they bring Shu-Jen, who has learned some English, the baby and Ellington with them. After a successful mission to drop supplies to troops on an offensive in Burma, Cliff and his crew learn that their airbase is being bombed by the Japanese. Although fired on by enemy planes, Cliff manages to land and plans to evacuate the base. Tragically, he learns that Shu-Jen has been killed in the attack and that the baby is missing. As Wylie has also been killed, Cliff is now in command and orders the plane to leave without him. Cliff then goes back to where Shu-Jen was killed and hears a baby crying. In a pile of rubble, Cliff finds his daughter alive, under the body of Ellington, who died protecting her. A Japanese plane returns to strafe the base and Cliff is hit. He places his identification tags in the baby's hands, then mans an anti-aircraft gun and shoots down several planes before being killed in a direct hit. In 1957, at Los Angeles International Airport, Alice and Phil, Dan and Mona, and others from Cliff's crew eagerly await the arrival of a flight. After many years of searching, Father Cairns has located Cliff and Shu-Jen's daughter in an orphanage in Hong Kong and has sent her to America to be looked after by her parents' friends. A teenager (Tita Aragon), displaying Cliff's dog tags, descends the steps from the plane, and they all embrace.

An Afghan outlaw finally saves a British officer at the cost of his own life. On the mountainous frontier between British India and Afghanistan, circa 1860s, Zarak Khan kisses Salma, the youngest wife of his father, Haji Khan. Outraged, his father orders Zarak to be flogged to death but spares his life at the urging of an elderly Mullah. Zarak now leaves his village and becomes a notorious outlaw, prompting the British to assign a Major Ingram to capture him. Zarak and Ingram have several encounters, developing a grudging respect for each other. When Ingram is captured by Ahmad, one of Zarak's rivals, Zarak risks his life to save the British officer. —dinky-4 of Minneapolis

A trapper and his two partners work as scouts for a remote army fort where they witness an incompetent colonel's decision to throw his small unprepared garrison against Red Cloud's sizable Sioux force. Crude and uncivilized backwoods trapper Jed Cooper and his two partners sign up as scouts in a remote Oregon army fort, manned chiefly by untrained rookie soldiers. Jed, flirting with the idea of leading a more settled life, decides he needs a woman to start the process, and selects Corinna Marston, the beautiful young wife of Colonel Marston, commander of the next fort down the line. Marston arrives and announces to commanding officer Captain Riordan that he has lost his fort and most of his men to an Indian attack and that he, as ranking officer, is assuming command. Riordan, a young, but sensible officer, is outraged when he learns that Marston, posted out west for having lost his 1500-man command during a Civil War battle, has ordered the entire fort's complement, totally unprepared for combat and outnumbered, to march out against experienced Indian warriors. —Doug Sederberg <vornoff@sonic.net>

When strongman Samson rejects the love of the beautiful Philistine woman Delilah, she seeks vengeance that brings horrible consequences they both regret. Though his people, the Israelites, are enslaved by the Philistines, Samson (Victor Mature), strongest man of the tribe of Dan, falls in love with the Philistine Semadar (Dame Angela Lansbury), whom he wins by virtue of a contest of strength. But Semadar betrays him, and Samson engages in a fight with her real love, Ahtur (Henry Wilcoxon), and his soldiers. Semadar is killed, and her sister Delilah (Hedy Lamarr), who had loved Samson in silence, now vows vengeance against him. She plans to seduce Samson into revealing the secret of his strength and then to betray him to the Philistine leader, The Saran of Gaza (George Sanders). —Jim Beaver <jumblejim@prodigy.net> Samson (Victor Mature), the hero of the Israelites, wins the hand of a Philistine woman, Semadar (Dame Angela Lansbury), in a contest of strength. When she is killed during a conflict on her wedding night, however, Samson becomes a hunted man, whom the Philistines, including Semadar's sister, Delilah (Hedy Lamarr), want to punish. This becomes complicated, however, when Samson suddenly acquires God-given strength, and Delilah's true feelings for Samson surface. —Jwelch5742

Perky young Nanette attempts to save the marriage of her uncle and aunt by untangling Uncle Jimmy from several innocent but ensnaring flirtations. Attempting one such unentanglement, Nanette enlists the help of theatrical producer Bill Trainor, who promptly falls in love with her. The same thing happens when artist Tom Gillespie is called on for help. But soon Uncle Jimmy's flirtations become too numerous, and Nanette's romances with Tom and Bill run into trouble. Will Uncle Jimmy's marriage survive, and will Nanette find happiness with Tom, Bill, or somebody else? —Jim Beaver <jumblejim@prodigy.net>