It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

This is a good 'rainy afternoon film'. It is harmless, entertaining and well made. It was directed by old pro Richard Thorpe. Robert Taylor plays an independent sailboat owner based on the southern coast of England (with the script explaining why he is an American) who 'takes people where they want to go'. One day a mysterious man with a briefcase who calls himself Mr. Anselm books his boat for a coastal tour. After setting out, he says he wants instead to go to a port in the Netherlands. Taylor is not supposed to do foreign trips without permission from his harbour master, but as he is offered a substantial amount of money by the man (whose briefcase is stuffed with cash), he agrees. The man says he is Dutch and hence does not normally get seasick, but on this occasion he says he does not feel well at all, and goes to lie down in his cabin. Later when Taylor takes him a cup of tea, he finds the man lying dead on his bed. We later discover that he has been murdered by someone tampering with his insulin supply before boarding, as he was a diabetic. Taylor uses the little key hanging round the man's neck on a chain to open the briefcase, and takes the cash owing to him, leaving the rest intact and shutting the briefcase. In using the key, he accidentally discovers that the man has taped to his chest, under his shirt, a small envelope containing a little hand-drawn map. He puts it back and goes back on deck, to steer into the Dutch harbour. Before he can get there, however, a pretty girl comes up in a small motorboat saying that she is the dead man's daughter. Taylor breaks the news to her and she says she wants to look at her father, and goes down below. Taylor follows her after a while and finds her ransacking the cabin, looking urgently for something. She has pried open the briefcase and is searching everywhere. She runs away, gets back in her boat and goes back into the harbour. Taylor looks and sees that the map is still taped to the man's chest, and that she has missed it. He takes it and hides it in his private stowaway with his gun. He later discovers that the girl was an impostor and was not the dead man's daughter at all. The intrigue deepens as Taylor is taken into custody by the Dutch police and removed to the Hague, where a senior Dutch police inspector is played by a gruff Donald Wolfit. He informs Taylor that the dead man was really a Mr Sluiter, who was head of the Hague Police Force. He had made a secret trip to England as part of a confidential investigation. The plot thickens and thickens and thickens, with villains turning up, some unctuous and rich, some thuggish. The fake daughter gets murdered, and there is menace all around. David Kossof is particularly brilliant as a supporting actor, playing a character named Willem Dekker. He adds a great deal of liveliness to the film. This is all good fun and well recommended.

This sort of film could only have been made late in Robert Taylor's career. That's because under the old studio system, he was one of MGM's stars and the pictures they put him in were all very well written and produced. "The House of the Seven Hawks", in contrast, is not particularly well written or produced and shows just how far Taylor's career had sunk after he finally left MGM. Although this film was distributed by MGM, it was made by a crappy old film company in the UK and Holland--a far cry from his fancified MGM roots.In this film, Taylor plays a schooner captain who is willing, when needed, to skirt British law. In this case, a Dutch undercover policeman offers to pay Taylor the then princely sum of 500 pounds to sneak him into Holland--and Taylor has no idea he's a cop. However, on the way, the man is found dead in his bunk--seemingly from a heart attack. When he reports this death to Dutch officials, he is taken into custody. After all, the authorities want to know why this man was trying to sneak back in the country. In addition, suddenly Taylor has acquired some 'friends' who also are very curious about what has happened not only to the dead man but some key he supposedly had on him or some mysterious overlay.All in all, the film has only a moderately engaging plot and is very low energy. As a result, it just plods along until it ultimately ends. Nothing fancy or special about this one--just a journeyman performance by an actor who deserved better.

This movie just doesn't have the most exciting or best mystery-elements around. It's a rather dull movie that lacks most of the required genre elements. Although it tries in parts- this is no film-noir but even for a 'standard' thriller type of movie this one just isn't good enough.The story isn't the most interesting one around but it's even worse how the story is told. Some of the sequences go on for far too long, without anything interesting happening in it. Problem is that the story felt the need to put in way too much (redundant) dialog. Guess that they just desperately tried to make the movie longer, since it's a quite short one (92 minutes). The movie really isn't build up well and in the beginning it's too unclear were the movie is trying to head to.The movie picks some weird and unbelievable plot-lines. Besides that, the movie also doesn't offer any real surprises. It's pretty clear from the beginning on who are going to be the good and bad guys and gals of the movie. It's true that the movie gets better toward the end but it's all too late to still fully save the movie. In its build up the movie simply lacks all the things needed to make a good and tense genre movie with. For a thriller this movie is just too dull and totally not interesting enough to follow. The characters all remain too flat and the only established actor in this movie is Robert Taylor, who does his very best but just can't carry this movie on his own. I mean this movie is not even good or really interesting to watch for the most hardened Robert Taylor fans.For me it was a big plus that the movie is set and actually filmed- and almost entirely set in The Netherlands. It was all very recognizable. It's locations and atmosphere works well for the movie, although it's too bad that they didn't made the trouble to cast Dutch actors in the roles of Dutch, not even for the bit parts, which was a bit distracting but obviously only should be so when you're Dutch yourself.By no means the worst genre movie I've ever seen but just not among one of the best or most refreshingly original ones either. Somewhat watchable but not really recommendable to anyone.5/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

Very disappointing.Taylor was a very good looking man which netted him a good career in Hollywood and this film at least showed that he could swim! His acting ability did'nt amount to much but this film made no demands in that department.