It's an early talkie with an excess of talk but not much action. The sets are great and Redmoat Manor perched on a cliff looks like a wild gothic house but the plot is routine; escape, capture, escape, capture, lights going out, screams etc. Warner Oland is OK as Dr. Fu Manchu but he makes a better Charlie Chan. The film gives Fu Manchu a back story that explains his motive of revenge so that there is nothing 'mysterious' about him. In the books he is a villain from the start with no explanation which makes him more threatening. The rest of the cast are also OK, Jean Arthur looking fine of course but yet to reach the golden age of her career and Neil Hamilton being sufficiently stalwart as Dr Petrie. Unfortunately William Austin as Sylvester Wadsworth is rather annoying as the supposedly comic relief. The film is vaguely based on the first book by Sax Rohmer about Fu Manchu, very vaguely. They should have stuck to the original more closely which among other things had a killer centipede!