The Sand Pebbles: A Refreshing Display of Morals and Good in a Cruel World

“CHINA 1926 . . . Ravaged from within by corrupt warlords . . . oppressed from without by the great world powers who had beaten China to her knees a century before . . . China . . . a country of factions trying to unite to become a nation . . . through revolution . . . “

This is the prologue to The Sand Pebbles, a wrenching 1966 film set on a US gunboat down a river in China.  The film’s protagonist, Jake Holman, is considered a Jonah the moment he boards the ship. Things keep going wrong; first the head coolie dies in the engine room, later he gets involved trying to defend a woman and is accused of her murder.  What was remarkable about the movie was how sharply the morals were laid out.  Directors back then were not afraid of taking stands–what’s right is right, and there’s no ambiguity or fuzziness about what the audience will root for.  “We are going down this river to show the US flag,” says the ship’s captain.

In 1967, Steve McQueen was nominated for an Oscar for his role as Jake Holman.  The ship’s captain is played by Richard Crenna, who faces a phalanx of angry local citizens who want to hang Holman over the death of Chinese citizens.  Holman is a loner, pleased that the little gunboat requires just one engineer, but baffled by the fact that the captain prefers to hire local Chinese to run the engine room instead of using navy men.  Holman is also intrigued with life in China that he witnesses when he joins a shore party to rescue missionaries who turn out not to want to be rescued at all.

The American head missionary tries to turn his back on the US Navy because it appears that it’s hurting his reputation among the Chinese, but when guns begin firing the missionary dies.  Despite trying to turn his back on his country nobody gets out alive, except Holman who might just live out his days in China, which by all accounts is more appealing to him than returning to the US.