Paper Tiger (1975)

David Niven of course reached the high point of his career with his Best Actor Oscar for Separate Tables, where he played a blowhard "major' who was a permanent guest at Wendy Hiller's establishment. 18 years later he kind of revives that character when he takes a job as a tutor for Toshiro Mifune's little boy Ando in Paper Tiger.Like in Separate Tables Niven puts on a great front about his great war exploits which is all a front to hide a deeply flawed man. Here he's doing the same thing for Ando. Mifune is the Japanese ambassador to some Asian island country, not named but I'm guessing Sri Lanka because there is a reference to a Tamil minority that is a rebel faction. Anyway these rebels or at least this cell of them led by Irene Tsu decide to kidnap the Japanese Ambassador's son to call attention to their prisoners. As we've seen many times, mostly in the Middle East, they'll kill the kid and Niven who was with him at the time unless their comrades are released from prison. Niven who also appropriates the rank of major in this film as well is actually forced to become the hero he's told Ando he was. He never got that chance in Separate Tables. I think this might have been aimed at the kiddie market, but it's way too bloody and violent for that. Niven already did that with Please Don't Eat The Daisies and he would do a couple of films for Disney Studios which were certainly better suited than Paper Tiger.Still it's decently entertaining, but not for the little ones.

PAPER TIGER is an intriguing little comedy thriller with an unusual storyline. The film as a whole has a number of diverse ingredients which gel together quite well and lead up to a satisfying whole. It's entirely forgotten these days, despite the starring roles and the presence of Hollywood director Ken Annakin (SWISS FAMILY ROBINSON), which is a bit of a shame.David Niven nails his character just right in playing a Walter Mitty type who regales his associates with stories of derring-do in the war (the flashback scenes are very funny). He travels to a made-up Far Eastern country to become English tutor to a Japanese ambassador, and the film chronicles their friendship. Ando, the child actor, stars in his only screen role and is very endearing, but all eyes are on the excellent Toshiro Mifune playing his father. I noted that Mifune nearly got his son kidnapped in Kurosawa's HIGH & LOW, well it really does happen here! The film has a fairly slow first half although the second half picks up with all manner of terrorist activities and some choppy action. The latter scenes with Niven and Ando are very well handled and the film narrowly avoids being overly sentimental, remaining funny instead. The Malaysian locations standing in for the made-up country are fun and Hardy Kruger is great as a reporter. Overall, PAPER TIGER is a fun, warming little thriller with Niven on top form.

Paper Tiger is a harmless adventure movie which tries to cater for juvenile and adult audiences. It is lifted slightly above its station by strong performances from David Niven and Toshiro Mifune. The central theme of what can go wrong if you live your life as one big lie is quite interesting too. It is neither a great movie nor a terrible one: merely a workmanlike, watchable time-filler. Niven plays Major Bradbury, an English gentleman who has got a job in a troubled Far East country tutoring a young and impressionable Japanese boy about western history. He entertains the boy, Koichi (Ando), by spinning him tales of wartime heroism and derring-do. However, all of Bradbury's tales are fanciful lies in which he presents himself as some kind of all-action hero. Koichi and Bradbury are kidnapped by guerillas, and Bradbury soon realises that he must try to live up the heroic stature he has invented for himself in order to help the boy to survive. Toshiro Mifune as the boy's father, a Japenese ambassador, gives a strong, moving and convincing performance. Niven also has his moments, especially when he looks into the mirror and is appalled by the "nothing" of a man he sees staring guiltily back at him near the film's climax. The story itself is interesting, but the handling isn't all that special. The film satisfies itself with being a straight-forward kidnap thriller fit for kids and adults alike, but the themes of real and imagined identity could actually have been explored much more closely and maturely if the target audience was just adults. Still, a family film is what the makers decided to make, and a family film is what they've given us. On that level, this will do quite nicely for a rainy Saturday afternoon - even if you'll have probably forgotten it by Sunday!

By this time in his career, debonair British actor David Niven was making films purely for the money. This effort was strangely different from other entries under this guise. The story of a dreamer facing the consequences of his masculine boasts is entertaining, and draws on his performance in Separate Tables.There is a certain sadness, watching Niven as one of life's losers trying to make amends with one last act of heroism, full of pathos and regret. The film itself is nothing spectacular, but Niven manages to rescue it from oblivion, and credit where credit's due, he almost succeeds.