the film debuted at the edinburgh festival but struggled to find commercial distribution in england. the "manchester guardian" called it "an honest-to-goodness attempt to describe the course of politico-military events in post-war malaya" but "it often looks and sounds quite unnecessarily bogus." c. a. lejeune of the "observer" thought the film was less effective than david macdonald's earlier "desert victory" because of all the "reconstructed school of documentary" scenes but did succeed as "a picture of hard work and good soldiering gradually overcoming the fears of the native population, the incredibly difficult terrain, and a relentless enemy shielded by the jungle."