The Return of Mr. Moto is a Mr. Moto film in name only. There's no resemblance between this movie and the wonderfully entertaining films that Peter Lorre made almost 30 years prior. To begin with, the plot of The Return of Mr. Moto is pretty much a muddled mess. It has something to do with sabotaged oil wells in the Middle East and a meeting of world leaders to discuss oil and oil contracts. But really, none of it mattered much to me as I lost interest after about 20 minutes. A well-written post-WWII, "modern" Moto film might have been fun, but this one fails miserably. In addition to the lifeless plot, the movie is saddled with cheap looking sets, a ridiculous plot device involving Moto in disguise (there's no way putting on glasses and a goatee would have fooled anyone), and some less than stellar acting on the part of many in the supporting cast. To sum it up, The Return of Mr. Moto is one sad, drab, lifeless affair.And what's with Henry Silva playing Moto? By 1965, surely they could've come up with someone of Japanese descent to play the character. Don't get me wrong, I like Silva. He made some really cool movies in the 70s – particularly some of his Italian films. But Silva as Moto? I'm sorry but he's about as Japanese as I am – and that's not at all.

I'm not one of the reviewers who apparently lined up to bash this movie; I think that 20th Century-Fox guaranteed it a hostile reception by inviting comparison with the fondly-remembered Peter Lorre series of thirty years before. On its own it's a efficiently-produced crime thriller that moves along briskly and offers some genuine surprises and suspense to open-minded viewers. It's been suggested by some (including Henry Silva himself, in the DVD's audio commentary) that Silva is physically unsuited to play an oriental, but the same could be said of the Hungarian Peter Lorre in the earlier series, or the Swedish Warner Oland who became the definitive Charlie Chan. And it's worth mentioning that Henry Silva has convincingly played characters of various nationality over the years.A beautiful letterboxed transfer of this film can be found as an extra on the final disc of the Peter Lorre/Moto DVD series; I found it well worth seeing for its entertainment value as well as Henry Silva's fascinating audio commentary.

One of the interesting things (looking back) about the original Mr. Moto series is its timing relative to WWII. It was also quite well written and, like many classics, provides some good commentary on society of that time. I think a post-WWII Moto film would be a good idea, but not this one. Poorly written and poorly acted, this film certainly does not do justice to a fine old classic. With the original Mr. Moto played by a German and Charlie Chan by a Swede, one would think that our enlightened 1960's society would at least come up with a proper Japanese-descent actor to play Moto. They certainly didn't pay a lot for the script and even less for sets. The feeble attempt with two folding screens and a cheap print of a Geisha on the Moto's wall didn't quite make us believe Moto's "orientalness". I hope someone takes another, better, stab at bringing back Mr. Moto.

Once the viewer recovers from the shock that star Henry Silva plays Mr. Moto totally straight--no awful accent or taped eyelids here--the truth emerges: The Return of Mr. Moto is a boring quota quickie. Shot on the cheap in black and white by producer Robert Lippert, the only concessions to art are a few nice set ups by cinematographer Basil Emmott, who had been shooting British films since the early 1920s. The story involves oil concessions in the Mid-East (some things never change!) but the film looks and plays like one of the many West German Edgar Wallace krimis of the period, with lots of people skulking around shadowy corners. The only thing missing is Klaus Kinski.