The supporting cast features Sydney Greenstreet, John Hodiak, and Lionel Barrymore, with Richard Loo and Gilbert Roland.

He goes to see his friend, newspaper publisher John Manchester, about a scheme to smuggle desperately needed rubber out of Japanese-occupied Malaya.

They slip into Malaya and contact Carnaghan's associate, the Dutchman, who recruits a gang for them from customers in his saloon, including Romano.

Using money and intimidation, they succeed in purchasing all the available rubber, but eventually the Japanese commander, Colonel Tomura, gets wind of the scheme.

On the last trip to transport the remaining rubber (belonging to German plantation owner Bruno Gerber) to a waiting freighter, Carnaghan smells an ambush.

[5] This film was the first occasion on which James Stewart worked with Spencer Tracy since his screen debut in Murder Man (1935) in which he had a minor role with sixth billing.

The New York Times critic Bosley Crowther called the film "a rousing, old-fashioned thriller about bold men with wily minds and crushing fists.

Scenarist Frank Fenton crowded plenty of action into the script and Richard Thorpe's direction keeps the screen pulsing with excitement".