The Ugly American, based on the 1958 bestseller in which Eugene Burdick and William Lederer angrily arraigned the arrogance, ignorance and indifference of Americans stationed abroad, was initially intended as a slashing attack on the sort of official who thinks he can heal the world's wounds by rubbing gold in them. It turns out to be just one more installment of Terry and the Pirates.
But no Dragon Lady. And hardly even a plot. U.S. Ambassador Marlon Brando—please do not laugh; this is a serious, Eastman Color picture—arrives at his post in South Sarkhan (read South Viet Nam) and hustles off to...