The Planter's Wife is a 1952 British war drama film directed by Ken Annakin, and starring Claudette Colbert, Jack Hawkins and Anthony Steel.

It is set against the backdrop of the Malayan Emergency and focuses on a rubber planter and his neighbours who are fending off a campaign of sustained attacks by Communist insurgents while also struggling to save their marriage.

Jim is having domestic difficulties with his American wife Liz, who is planning to take their son Mike to England and not return.

However the title was criticised by the Colonial Office and overseas distributors because it could be interpreted as referring to racial discrimination, so it was changed to The Planter's Wife.

Rank's head of production, Earl St. John gave the script to Ken Annakin who agreed to direct.

Annakin interviewed Norma Shearer, Loretta Young, Joan Crawford, Olivia de Havilland and Claudette Colbert.

[18] Director Ken Annakin and a team gathered anecdotes from planters, policemen and soldiers in Malaya and shot second unit sequences there as well as Singapore and Malacca but for safety reasons during the ongoing Emergency, much of the filming was done in Ceylon, on the advice of Rank's Asian representative, John Dalton.

All the outside work was done with that rather cheating technique of back projection, by which the action is played out against a screen showing moving pictures of locations... What made it all the more absurd was the fact that we were filming in the middle of winter, and dressed only in bush shirt and shorts I was permanently frozen.

[22] The film was the sixth most popular movie of the year at the British box office in 1952, after The Greatest Show on Earth, Where No Vultures Fly, Son of Paleface, Ivanhoe and Mandy.

It was followed by The Quiet Man, The World in His Arms, Angels One Five (also with Hawkins), Reluctant Heroes, The African Queen and The Sound Barrier.

"[28] Variety said "The jungle campaign against local terrorists is depicted against a • commonplace domestic drama" and said "later action sequences compen- sate for the lame opening.