Cinema: East Meets East

A Girl Named Tamiko is a Panavision melting pot. British Actor Laurence Harvey, who was born in Lithuania, plays a half-Russian, half-Chinese photographer in Tokyo who wants to go to the U.S. France Nuyen, who was born in Marseille of a French mother and a Chinese father, plays Tamiko, a highborn Japanese girl who wants Harvey. Martha Hyer, who is as American as a mink-lined raincoat in July, also wants Harvey, and so does Miyoshi Umeki, an honest-to-Buddha Japanese, who plays a Ginza B-girl.

Surprisingly enough, beneath all the sukiyaki, Producer Hal Wallis has put together an entertaining little picture; the neon...