Instruct: Classify a review as either positive or negative.
Query: okay melodrama....fuller style

Army sergeant, Robert Stack, working undercover, breaks up a syndicate led by expatriate Robert Ryan, in this hard-boiled melodrama set against the urban sprawl of post-war Japan. Expert commentary by Fuller scholars James Ursini & Alain Silver makes it all seem rather more interesting than it is - yet, effective characterizations abound, notably Stack's taciturn investigator, later honed to perfection as The Untouchables' Elliot Ness, a radiant Shirley Yamaguchi as the love interest, and Robert Ryan as an unusually sympathetic villain (more avuncular than sexually ambivalent, as suggested by some commentators).The letterboxed image is fine, though the drab color transfer blunts the immediacy of Joe McDonald's on-location photography.