SoftInloveRox
Horrible, fascist and poorly acted
Paynbob
It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.
Justina
The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.
Martha Wilcox
The gangly James Stewart doesn't seem to understand anything or anyone other than his own culture, and how to treat ladies in this film. His character is despicable, and there are times when he is downright racist saying 'I don't take advice from Chinese people any more'. He fails to take you on the journey with him, and you get the feeling that in 1960 at the age of 52, he is growing old and getting set in his ways. His characters seems to be fixed at this point in his career which is why there is very little room for him to grow as an actor. Only John Ford would take him to the next level in 'The Man who shot Liberty Valance' two years later.
Hitchcoc
I am a huge Jimmy Stewart fan. Yet this film left me cold. I think that the director and the screenplay conspire to not let him develop as a character. One time he is doing some poignant scene, where one thinks he has turned a corner in his short-sighted racist view of the larger world, and in moment, he goes right back to where he was. There's no carry-over. This film takes place in 1944 as the U. S. forces are in Chine, looking out for a tenuous ally. This particular group is a demolitions team whose purpose is to blow up roads and bridges and move on. The Japanese are very formidable and have decimated the Chinese people. Stewart expects the Chinese to act like Americans (Sound familiar?) but can't get them to follow his lead. Starvation and pain have a way of doing that. His relationship with a Chinese woman is the most interesting. I'm sure the cowardly film boards kept anything from happening. Once that factor in the film is thrown out, there is a skeleton left and it's not a very interesting one.
gerdeen-1
Legendary American reporter Theodore H. White covered China in the 1940s, and he wrote the novel on which this unusual James Stewart feature is based. It's not quite anti-war, but it's a very long way from the flag-waving military movies that Stewart made in the 1950s.Stewart's character is a U.S. military engineer working with a small team trying to slow a Japanese advance in China. Though there's plenty of action (especially explosions), the emphasis is on the Americans' interaction with their Chinese allies -- which is fraught with problems. Stewart's character has a local love interest, played by Lisa Lu, but their relationship is nothing like a conventional GI romance."The Mountain Road" was obviously meant to be a thought-provoking look back at World War II, and to audiences in the early 1960s it probably was. The climax may have been almost shocking. In today's more jaded world, the movie is likely to strike many viewers as dull, with an ending that resolves very little. But it you still have a rose-colored view of the "Greatest War," and think it was less morally messy than our current conflicts, this could be enlightening.
krc-1
I first saw this as a 16 year-old on its release in the UK, and have seen only glimpses on TV since. What I remember most is, having the year before seen "The Big Country", recognising the similarity of the scores as having the same composer in Jerome Moross (I had taken my seat after the opening credits). I felt quite pleased with myself at the time. I thought the movie to be much along the lines of earlier James Stewart/Anthony Mann classics, although with not quite the punch or pace. Harry Morgan's performance explains why he was never short of roles and why he became a stalwart member of the "MASH" brigade. Definitely worth another viewing.
