Wonderful character development!

Purely Joyful Movie!

Boring, over-political, tech fuzed mess

Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

After the success of THAT MAN FROM RIO, director Philippe de Broca and star Jean-Paul Belmondo reteamed for this movie. Belmondo is a young man with a dimwitted fiancee and a predatory prospective mother-in-law. His saving grace is that he is a billionaire. On being told he is broke, he has friendly Chinese philosopher Valéry Inkijinoff arrange to kill him -- a two-million-dollar insurance payout will be split between the philosopher and his fiancee. However, on seeing Ursula Andress doing a striptease (without, alas, taking off any clothes; what's the point of watching French movies?), he regains his will to live, as any sensible man would.It's based on one of Jules Vernes' voyages extraordinaires with almost all of it shot on location. In addition, the situations are very funny, in that frantic manner that the French farceurs did such a good job at. Unfortunately, while the situations are comic, only Miss Andress and Jean Rochefort as Belmondo's long-suffering valet show any comic sensibilities.French audiences didn't seem to care. It was successful. De Broca was a good, commercial director who always knew what his audience wanted and gave it to them, even if it seems he didn't -- or perhaps couldn't -- give them more than they might expect.

This globe-trotting (mostly set in China and India) comedy-adventure has a freewheeling "anything goes" spirit and some daring stunts, but its slapstick is mostly crude and its script aimless. Director Philippe De Broca and star Jean Paul Belmondo apparently tried to recreate their success of the previous year ("That Man From Rio", which I have not seen - yet), but this film is little more than a collection of stunts. Though if you want to see Belmondo in drag and performing a striptease (!), this is the right place. Ursula Andress, in her prime, gets second billing but is not in the movie much for the first hour or so; then she becomes a co-star. ** out of 4.

Back in the '60s, everyone loved a cool spy flick. James Bond, Derek Flint, Harry Palmer (and even Maxwell Smart) were the famous secret agents, but probably not as many people remember "Les tribulations d'un chinois en Chine". It has French everyman Arthur Lempereur (Jean-Paul Belmondo) getting involved in espionage in Hong Kong. A really fun scene is the whole chase scene. However, in my opinion, the intrigue and stuff gets overshadowed by Ursula Andress's presence. There's one scene in particular that will very likely remind you of her role in "Dr. No".So, there always had to be spy stories involving hot babes. A flick similar to this one is "Die Holle von Macao" (also called "The Corrupt Ones") which starred Elke Sommer. You'll probably like both movies.

I won't say much as you need to see the movie to be caught by it's adventure theme that's never stop. Bebel is great, Ursulla, sexy of course, and the plethora of second characters make a kind of in movie family. If you like to travel and enjoy visual humor, this movie is for you.