The film was made by Warner Brothers as a programmer. It was a remake of Archer's play The Green Goddess, updating the action to modern Iraq. It encountered strong objections from the OWI, who charged that its plot was unintentionally both anti-British and anti-Arab and was potentially offensive to America's ally and to neutral Arab countries. The film was already granted an export licence, but pressure from the State Department overrode this. Consequently, it was the only Warners' film not to receive an overseas release during the 1940s.[2]
Reception
Writing in Turner Classic Movies, critic Frank Miller noted that, "Warner Bros. had no problem re-making The Green Goddess, the twice-filmed tale of a duplicitous, lustful Himalayan Raja, as Adventure in Iraq, the tale of a duplicitous, lustful Iraqi sheikh. In truth, the writers seem to have expended more effort updating the story to World War II than they did changing the location and the villain's cultural background." He also described the film as "hardly an A-picture" with a cast "made up of low-budget veterans."[3] A review of the film by Craig Butler in AllMovie noted that "the plot is overly familiar and not especially believable. Dialogue is of the cliched and stilted variety, and the characters have stock written all over them. David Ross Lederman's by the book direction doesn't help matters."[4]
The film earned $147,000 domestically and did not earn anything outside the US because it was not released there.[1]
References
^ abcWarner Bros financial information in The William Schaefer Ledger. See Appendix 1, Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, (1995) 15:sup1, 1-31 p 24 doi:10.1080/01439689508604551
