Sinful Cargo

Mobsters smuggle illegal Chinese laborers into the United States using a fake Hollywood film studio as a cover. A boatload of gangster "extras" in oriental make-up and costume sail out to an offshore "location shoot," then switch places with real Chinamen who return to the mainland in their place. The operation, being carried out under the noses of the local police, draws federal investigator Alan O'Conner to the scene. He teams up with plucky reporter, Bobbie Reynolds, who has been doing some digging of her own into the suspicious studio that never seems to produce any movies. When they edge too close to the truth, Agent O'Conner is shot and left for dead, and Bobbie is abducted and taken for a last ride towards her own "final act."

George Hirliman produced Sinful Cargo, the first of four G-men films to feature his wife, actress Eleanor Hunt, and Conrad Nagel. Director Crane Wilbur started out as an actor in the silent era, appearing with Pearl White in 1914's The Perils Of Pauline. In 1915 he began writing screenplays, and is now best remembered for I Was A Communist For The FBI (1951), House of Wax (1953) and Mysterious Island (1961). He directed over 30 films, most notably the exploitation classic Tomorrow's Children (1934) and The Bat (1959).

• drama