Karry Best movie of this year hands down!

GurlyIamBeach Instant Favorite.

Huievest Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

Sienna-Rose Mclaughlin The movie really just wants to entertain people.

Tad Pole . . . says Megan Davis, some sort of United Nations High Commissioner, about 59 minutes, 20 seconds into THE BITTER TEA OF GENERAL YEN. Her assistant, Mr. Jones, has just pegged China's 1932 population at about 500 million people. No rat census figures are provided here, perhaps because THE BITTER TEA OF GENERAL YEN depicts a densely disordered den of disastrously deplorable, devious, and depraved denizens posing a ticking time bomb challenge to Western Civilization and Human Culture, aka Humanity. Though Columbia Pictures tried to warn our USA Homeland of the Chinese Menace at a Historic Juncture when the problem could have been handled by a few thousand kegs of "BITTER TEA" (think the Kool-Aid vats at Jonestown), a series of Weak Presidents have allowed this Cess Pool to Fester. Breeding like rabbits, China's burgeoning head count is now A BILLION AND A HALF (again, that's just the Homo Sapiens, NOT the rodents!). No country should be permitted to have more people than our USA. This is only common sense. We cannot and MUST NOT allow ourselves to become outnumbered! (Even Gen. Yen thought he was having the last laugh, with American Megan clearly unaware of this First Principle of Military Defense.) Now, as Rocket "Man" Kim--China's rocking horsey stocking horse boy--threatens us daily, it's highly gratifying to know that we can rely upon Leader Trump to deal appropriately with the Chinese Peril ONCE AND FOR ALL. There's not enough Bitter Tea left in China to do the trick, but Leader Trump has bunkers full of nukes, and his fingers are hovering over The Button as I type!

GManfred This picture is on TV pretty often, so often that I usually miss it. The title sounds uninviting, like a dull movie about a tea plantation. Then I saw it on a big screen last month at a film festival and I was astonished. I was especially astonished by Nils Asther's portrayal of the General, and I'm not sure I've seen him in anything else. It was a hypnotic performance, as good a job of acting as has ever been put on the Silver Screen. The film was early Stanwyck but she was as good as ever and, coupled with Asther, they worked magic.The picture has been reviewed about 50 times now and everyone recaps the plot. It's enough to say it is possibly Capra's best effort. I thought the pace of the film compared to "Lost Horizon", the action and energy of the opening scenes and then the placid unfolding of the main story, which in both cases turns out to be a love story - and then the knockout ending. Also noteworthy are the spectacular sets and the shimmering, immaculate photography. I saw it at Cinevent, Columbus, O., 5/13.

nomoons11 I knew going into this film what to expect just by the basic plot outline. What I didn't expect was how well made this film was.Normally with these old 30's dramas you get decent actors and a decent storyline with an average script. The actors have to keep up the paces to make the film work. This is not the case with this film. I was really surprised at the quality of every aspect of this film.The star of this film is not Barbara Stanwyck. Although most would think by her name alone it would be but she's very ordinary in this one. A lot of her 30's stuff is "Joe basic average". The star of this is Nils Asther. He is an absolute chameleon in this. The make-up he has is so convincing you'll look twice. Even though you can hear his Swedish accent come through you can still see how good his attempt at Chinese was. This film was his absolute pinnacle.The action scenes are done very very well. The shootout close to the end and the sequence early on in the orphanage are really very convincing. I'm just amazed at how well this film holds up even in this day and time.This film is known for one thing and one thing only and that's the interracial overtones it has. I'm here to tell you folks, it's so mild it didn't even come into play for my viewing. I mean it's there but the story really is about the downfall of a ruthless Chinese General. He's blindsided by the American girl he keeps hostage and his attempts to woo her.The ending though reminds me of a very similar film from around the same year...The Barbarian. Both have a very ridiculous ending. It doesn't fit with how Stanwyck played the character. I guess that's what the author of the book intended. Always confuses me how here and there, back in the day, at how Hollywood throws these curve ball films in to make America think about interracial issues. What's makes me laugh is does anyone remember back then any stars actually doing what they portray? There's no way they thought this would be a financial success back then with this subject matter.All this being said, this is a really fine effort. Just a very well made and engrossing film.

writers_reign Though it dates from 1933 both director Capra and actress Stanwyck were veterans of the movies and had indeed already worked together notably on Miracle Woman, a thinly-veiled take on Aimee Semple MacPherson. This time the canvas is broader embracing racism, politics and miscegenation just for starters. Swedish Nils Asther was convincing as the eponymous Chinese warlord who more or less kidnaps Stanwyck who has ostensibly journeyed to China to marry her missionary fiancé. Much has been made of the erotic dream sequence which gives Stanwyck an opportunity to confront her sexual confusion - attraction/repulsion - regarding Yen. For the time the setting was remarkably authentic and we have to score it as a little-known/seen gem.