The Chairman (1969)

Director:

J. Lee Thompson

Writers:

Jay Richard Kennedy (novel)
Ben Maddow (screenplay)

Release Date:

July 1969 (UK)

Genre:

Action | Drama

Tagline:

"This is it. They're finally together. Right now we can detonate our explosive and destroy the Chairman."

Plot:

An American scientist is sent to Red China to steal the formula for a newly developed agricultural enzyme...

Plot Keywords:

Implant | Spy | Implanted Monitor | Fake Defector | Border

Cast

Gregory Peck	...	John Hathaway
Anne Heywood	...	Kay Hanna
Arthur Hill	...	Shelby
Alan Dobie	...	Benson
Conrad Yama	...	The Chairman
Zienia Merton	...	Ting Ling
Ori Levy	...	Shertov
Eric Young	...	Yin
Burt Kwouk	...	Chang Shou
Alan White	...	Gardner
Keye Luke	...	Professor Soong Li
Francesca Tu	...	Soong Chu (as Francisca Tu)
Mai Ling	...	Stewardess
Gordon Sterne	...	U.S. Airforce Sergeant
Robert Lee	...	Hotel Night Manager

Also Known As:

The Most Dangerous Man in the World (UK)

Runtime:

USA:98 min (FMC Library Print) | Spain:93 min

Country:

UK | USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Westrex Recording System)

Certification:

UK:A | Finland:(Banned) (1969) (theatrical) | Finland:K-12 (1989) (video) | USA:M (original rating) | USA:PG (re-rating) | Singapore:NC-16 | Norway:16 (original rating) | Sweden:15

Filming Locations:

Pinewood Studios, Iver Heath, Buckinghamshire, England, UK

Company:

APJAC Productions

Trivia:

Average Shot Length = ~4.3 seconds. Median Shot Length = ~3.9 seconds.

Excedrin Headache # 9

***SPOILERS*** Cold War espionage drama with the US and USSR working as a team to prevent the Communist Chinese from developing this enzyme that would make crops cold and high altitude, like barren snow capped mountain ranges, resistant.

This amazing discovery would give the Chinese Comunists a monopoly in food-stuffs all over the world. They would also be able to use it to blackmail, or buy off, all of the free and third world nations. The Chinese who developed this enzyme with the help of their top scientist Soing Li,Keye Luke,need just one more piece of this growth enzyme puzzle to really get their act on the road to world domination by controlling the worlds food supply: Mass Production. Both the US and USSR are very determined to get their hands on this enzyme and use the one person who can get into Communist China American Prof. John Hathway, Gregory Peck. Prof. Hathway is not only an expert in the field of growth enzymes but also a former associate of the imminent Prof. Soing Li. Only Prof. Hathaway can come up with the formula to mass produce this enzyme which is why the Chairman, Conrad Yama, of the Chinese Peoples Republic eagerly wants him to come to his country and help out Prof. Li with his experiment.

Using the code name "Minitor" the US intelligence service, the CIA, implant a transmitter into Hathaway's head to pick up all the things that he sees and hears in China as well as all his conversations that he has with that country's high echelon governments officials like the Chairman. What Prof. Hathaway doesn't know is that besides a transmitter he also has an explosive device in his skull that can blow his head off as soon as the Chinese suspect that he's a spy for the US.

Prof. Hathaway's main goal in his China visit is to get his hands on the secret enzyme formula but it's encased in the wall of Prof. Li's house and almost impossible for him to get at. Later Hathaway, by crawling under the floorboards and melting the encased steel-box with acid, did get into the hidden compartment where he thought that the film of the enzyme was. Prof. Hatawy is shocked to find that it's no longer there. Prof. Li had since been accused of being a traitor to the people and forced from his post, by the Red Guard, as a top Communist Chinese in the education and scientific departments.

Hurt and humiliated Prof. Li, who was forced to be exhibited around town wearing a dunce cap with signs calling him a traitor,later commits suicide leaving his daughter Ting Ling, Zienia Merton, his most precious possession: the little Red Book of quotes of Moa Tse-Tung. Unknown to Prof Hathaway is that in that book Prof. Li skillfully and in a code ,that only he and Prof. Hathaway can decipher, is the secret enzyme formula.

Unusual film made during the hight of the Cold, as well as Vietnam, War back in 1969 with Prof. Hathaway driving an armored car and then running for his life towards the Russian-Mongolian, Communist Chinese, border with a bomb planted in his head. With the bomb about to be detonated by those who sent him there, into Communist China. His government the US as well as the USSR & UK.

The Soviet Red Army who's job it was to get Prof. Hathaway across the border safely were also saddled with the order of not firing on the perusing Chinese Red Army troops. This in order to prevent a war from breaking out between the two Communist super-powers, which made things even more complicated.