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Robert Ryan bosses a little band of thieves with a nice military precision. He and his men are ex-G.I.s. and they play their game like an army patrol in action.
They are "briefed" on an "operation"; they carry not guns or rods, but "weapons" supplied by their own ordnance officer; they attack an "objective" and never make a getaway—they "withdraw." When they are not in action, most of them behave like polite, narrow-lapelled Madison Avenue admen.
After the robber patrol knocks off a train, Ryan inducts a new enlisted man, tough-talking Robert Stack. Ryan does not know that Stack is an undercover cop for the U.S. Army. But Ryan has a paid informer himself—a Tokyo newsman of mixed Oriental background. This Peiping Tom discovers Stack's true identity, and then comes the fierce chase through Tokyo. It all ends with Villain Ryan, despite his prowess as a crooked field commander, getting his comeuppance at a rooftop carnival.
Actor Ryan is smooth and businesslike, and Stack is competent. Next to the view, though, the biggest delight is Japan's picture-book beauty Shirley Yamaguchi, who plays Stack's "kimono" (i.e., moll); she has all the fluid rhythm of a ripple in a pond.