Listonixio Fresh and Exciting

MusicChat It's complicated... I really like the directing, acting and writing but, there are issues with the way it's shot that I just can't deny. As much as I love the storytelling and the fantastic performance but, there are also certain scenes that didn't need to exist.

Ginger Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

Aryana Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.

zardoz-13 "Guns of Navarone" director J. Lee Thompson and leading man Gregory Peck teamed up for the fourth time in the Cold War era thriller "The Chairman," but this preposterous spy thriller has little to distinguish it aside from its gimmick. When an agricultural enzyme enables the Red Chinese to grow crops despite adversarial climate conditions, the Americans dispatch an American scientist, Dr. John Hathaway (Gregory Peck of "MacKenna's Gold"), to go to China and confabulate with his old colleague from his Princeton days. Now, the gimmick is that the Americans have planted a small plastic receiver in the back of his head that allows him to talk to them about his progress without relying on any external device. Basically, aside from showing our well-dressed protagonist what he has in his head, this film doesn't have to worry about concealing some costly electronic device. Meantime, the suspicious Red Chinese cannot figure out how our hero is communicating with the Americans. After a long, tedious build up that includes a meeting with Chairman Mao during a ping-pong game, Hathaway has to make a desperate bid for the border. Thompson cuts back and forth between Hathaway and the American military who keep tabs on his progress. Gregory Peck wears his trench coat well, but he is no more convincing as a scientist than he is a spy. What a dreary mess with a last-minute revelation that develops little tension.

bkoganbing The Chairman is a film of its time, it was made when the Sino-Soviet split was just coming to the fore, when even the Russians were getting worried about their ally south of their Asian border. It's not hard to figure out, China is big, but very full, Siberia is big and very empty. Geography even trumps politics and ideology.Back in those days we still were not giving diplomatic recognition to the People's Republic of China. In fact you search the stories about China back in those days and it will inevitably be called Red China. You haven't heard that expression in a couple of decades now. So getting an American scientist for whatever reason in the country, was difficult if not impossible. Remember this was also the days when the godhead figure of their revolution Mao Tse-Tung was doing a little ideological house cleaning with those fired up young people, his Red Guards who were scaring the world back then and with good reason. A Chinese scientist colleague of Gregory Peck's back in the day played by Keye Luke sends a letter to Peck most cryptic as it would have to have passed through censors. That triggers a little sky espionage where it is discovered that the Chinese are growing agricultural produce in places it shouldn't happen. Luke has discovered an enzyme to make it possible and with it the Chinese can get starving third world nations to its side by the droves. It's got the US and the USSR worried.Peck's mission should he accept it is to get the formula for that enzyme out of China, not so easy for an Occidental, but he's the only guy with scientific qualifications for the job. The plot is somewhat similar in this respect to Alfred Hitchcock's Torn Curtain.Oh, and they've got a real joker in the deck. Cold War Air Force general Arthur Hill who is running the show has implanted a listening device in Peck's skull so he can just talk and a spy satellite above China will pick it up and transmit. But they also have it rigged with an explosive device so Peck won't fall in enemy hands. And they don't tell him about that, cute.The Chairman is a good spy thriller with the action going along at a good clip. His race for the Soviet border will keep your adrenalin pumping the way Peck's character had to have been in the film. Best scene in the film is Peck's audience with Chairman Mao played by Conrad Yama. That was considerable license because Mao spoke no English.What I always found fascinating is that when Mao died in 1977 the revolution as he conceived it stopped with him. Today China, no longer called Red China, is your very typical oligarchic country that has restricted freedoms to be sure as the kids who were at Tiannamen Square will testify, but a country playing very typical power politics in the old fashioned way. My God they even have a stock exchange for capitalists. What would those idealistic young Red Guards think along with the man who inspired them?

ma-cortes An American scientific named Hathaway (Gregory Peck, after his acting in Stalking moon), Nobel prize winner , is enlisted by British Intelligence Service and assigned Mao's Red China to retrieve a formula about a revolutionary agricultural enzyme that eliminates starvation , diseases and multiply mass production . His chiefs (Arthur Hill , Alan Dobie) have implanted a microchip in his head for placing him in the solitary mission whose unique contact results to be Chang (Burt Kwouk , usual in Peter Sellers' Pink Panther). But he doesn't know that it can be exploded if the mission fails . Hathaway leaves his girlfriend Kay (Anne Heywood) and aboard airplane to Hong Kong . Later on , he's transported to north of China , nearly Russia , where he finds professor Soon Li (Keye Luke, the clever master in Kung-Fu series). There Hathaway interviews President Mao (Conrad Yama) .This is a political/fiction/thriller , plenty of intrigue , suspense and action-packed in its final part . The film is an espionage story originally written by Ben Maddow with historic communist remarks during Mao Tse Tung period , as the'Great leap' and 'Red book of Mao'. In fact , there had propaganda campaigns mounted by Hong Kong communists claiming the film was anti Mao and anti Chinese consequently filming was transferred to Taiwán . Stars Gregory Peck who gives nice acting , though originally intended to be as a starring vehicle for Frank Sinatra . It packs colorful and evocative cinematography , shot in Pinewood studios of London , by John Wilcox and uncredited Ted Moore . Atmospheric production design , it was used the lab set left over from Fox's Fantastic voyage (1966). Moving and suspenseful musical score by the great master Jerry Goldsmith .The film is lavishly produced by Mort Abrahams and Arthur P. Jacobs who previously produced 'Planet of apes' . The motion picture was middlingly directed by J.L. Thomson (1914-2002) , during his splendor and successful time in the 60s , when he directed hits as 'Mackenna's gold' , 'Cape fear' , 'Taras Bulba' and 'Guns of Navarone' ; though in his last period he only directed Charles Bronson vehicles , such as : 'Death wish 4' , 'Kinjite' , 'St Ives' , 'Messenger of Death' , among others . The movie will appeal to Gregory Peck devotees.

Tristan Gong I am interested in Hollywood movies about China all the time. 55 Days in Beijing, Seven Years in Tibet, Red Corner... I happened to see the Chairman and bought it without any hesitation. But, it turned out to be a complete disappointment not because performance and scenery but true China. In fact, I hate Mao's dictatorship in Red China, however, apparently, American people didn't and could't know much about Red China in 1969. In this movie, the starting music made me believe it was about Japan, what's worse, the Japanese-style-music was all through the movie. And, in 1969, Americans could not find anyone who can speak Mandarine well. What they could find was some Hong Kong-accent guys whose Mandarine made me confused and giggle. When I saw the Chairman, I realized the worst part began. Mao Zedong became much shorter and less-arrogant. He spoke English! Others Mandarine. From the very beginning, I could not find any clues about China Mainland. Everything was falsed too bad. I wondered if you shot the movie without getting a Chinese as a history adviser.