Enjoyable unpretentious melodrama from Universal with a strong cast - Basil Rathbone is reliably excellent as a French financier who is convicted of embezzlement so his off sider (Victor McLaglen) and wife (Sigrid Gurie) go to Rio near the penal colony. Gurie falls for a drunken engineer (Bob Cummings) just as Rathbone escapes.
This was well done. John Brahm does a solid job of direction, Rathbone and McLaglen are very good - I wish McLaglen had more to do in the second half but he is key at the end. Cummings is also effective in a non typical part - he's got a moustache and plays a drunk who gets redemption via loving Gurie. Gurie isn't very good - the role felt written for Marelene Dietrich.
The film was clearly meant to be set in Devil's Island but they never mention those words - I think it was a touchy subject for the French. The production values are effective - dingy bars, night clubs, etc. It pumps along, there is character work - Rathbone has a juicy role a man who loves his wife, is determined to let her go but can't.
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