THE RETURN OF DR. FU MANCHU (1930)

At the end of THE MYSTERIOUS DR. FU MANCHU Fu (Warner Oland) was apparently dead, Inspector Nayland Smith (O.P Heggie) was victorious, and Fu's adopted daughter Lia (Jean Arthur) was free to marry her sweetheart Jack (Neil Hamilton) who, as the son of Sir John Petrie, one of Fu's primary enemies, was on Fu's most wanted list. Out of respect for Fu's religion, Smith orders that an autopsy not be performed, which turns out to be a big mistake. Fu wasn't actually dead but merely in a state of deep suspended animation, and at his funeral, Fu's henchmen sneak him out of his coffin, and awaken him so he can prepare to do battle again in revenge for the death of his wife and son at the hands of the British. The first clue that all is not well comes when, on the day of Jack and Lia's wedding, Lia gets that strange trance feeling that Fu's presence always had on her. Before the wedding can proceed, the servant Fai Lu enters, says Fu is alive, and drops dead holding a piece of paper with a blood-stained dragon, Fu's infamous calling card. That night, despite the house being guarded, Lia is kidnapped (along with her Aunt Agatha) and used as bait to get at Jack. Both Nayland and Jack wind up in Fu's clutches. Fu plans to inject Nayland with a brain-scrambling drug, and later, a seriously wounded and partially paralyzed Fu forces Jack to operate on him. Will our heroes prevail or will Fu get the upper hand?

This sequel to the previous Fu Manchu film from a year earlier is better made and a bit more exciting, though Oland's Fu is a little less sinister-seeming than Boris Karloff's later iteration. One critic, Mark David Welsh, has written that Oland comes off like a "cuddly uncle" here, and while that's a bit of an exaggeration, Oland does sometimes feel more like a cranky Charlie Chan than an evil mastermind. But overall, this is passable early sound entertainment. The tone and pacing are out of a B-movie serial, with the set for the abandoned dye works that has become Fu's headquarters truly impressive. Jean Arthur and Neil Hamilton (pictured) don't have much chemistry but individually they're both fine—though Arthur has to suffer through one scene being carried out against her will as she yells, "You beast!"—as is Heggie as Nayland Smith. The return of William Austin as the shrieking nelly butler Sylvester is unwelcome. This film was billed in some of its original engagements as The New Adventures of Fu Manchu. The print, from a home video restoration presented by Kino Lorber, is in good shape. [Blu-ray]