The Bitter Tea of General Yen is a triumph of direction. It’s spectacular, dramatic, magnificently mounted and gorgeously artistic.

| Apr 25, 2023

This is what I find to be of such value in [it]; that it risks offence for the sake of constructing a dialogue, one fraught with so many perils in the realms of politics, religion, cultures and sex, that it would not be worth it if it weren’t necessary.

| Apr 25, 2023

Frank Capra, an imaginative director, with the aid of Joseph Walker, his cameraman, preserved the misty illusion through delicately screened photography and an interesting presentation of Nils Asther as the Chinese general.

| Apr 25, 2023

Director Frank Capra deserves much of the credit for this picture.

| Apr 25, 2023

Nils Asther gives a superb performance; one which will put him right back into the rank of front-line actors -- just where he was before talkie time.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Apr 25, 2023

The war scenes are sufficiently exciting to stir most anyone's blood. On the whole, it is good film entertainment, with only a thin plot to hold together the picturesque scenes.

| Apr 25, 2023

Well mounted and marked by fine individual performances on the part of Nils Asther, Barbara Stanwyck and Walter Connelly, the picture nevertheless takes a long time to tell its story.

| Apr 25, 2023

Nils Asther is magnificent as General Yen, Barbara Stanwyck is good, and Walter Connolly contributes a fine performance as a renegade American on Yen's staff. It is, in spite of its minor flaws, a dramatic, interesting picture.

| Apr 25, 2023

Overshadowing all else in this picture, adapted from the novel by the same name, is the superb work of Nils Asther.

| Apr 25, 2023

It is a story that is scarcely plausible but which has the saving grace of being fairly entertaining.

| Apr 25, 2023

While The Bitter Tea of General Yen is a distinguished photoplay in many respects, its chief virtue is in the acting of Mr. Nils Asther, one of the cinema's forgotten men.

| Apr 25, 2023

... Neither Nils Asther nor Barbara Stanwyck can shine interpreting their false characters. [Full review in Spanish]

| Apr 25, 2023

It is rich pictorially, the photography is excellent and the story is told connectedly and entertainingly.

| Apr 24, 2023

Though Barbara Stanwyck is starred and gives her usual finished performance, [it is Nils Asther] that makes the picture notable.

| Apr 24, 2023

The Bitter Tea of General Yen is, in our opinion, a picture worth seeing.

| Apr 24, 2023

Although there is nothing particularly sprightly about it. and some of the sequences are long and slightly tedious, the film is a fine example of how a large screen canvas may be filled with color and panoramic splendor.

| Apr 24, 2023

Seldom have we sat through a picture in which we were so interested in the fate of the players. It takes hold of you from the first flicker of the screen and you are still interested until the curtain falls. A fine absorbing piece of work.

| Apr 24, 2023

[The Bitter Tea of General Yen] offers perhaps as eloquent an example as is apt to happen along of the need that sometimes arises to make drastic alterations in the character and purpose of a book to fit it to the unique requirements of the cinema.

| Apr 24, 2023

The film is so far from the beaten path as to make its reception by the amusement-seeker extremely problematical. For the courage which inspired its production, all praise.

| Apr 24, 2023

Anyone who can enjoy love, battle, heart chills and hate in a picture, will like this one.

| Apr 24, 2023