Fuller uses L.A.'s Little Tokyo as the backdrop for a sympathetic portrayal of interracial romance imbedded in a police melodrama about the murder of a nightclub stripper. Two detectives, a Caucasian (Glenn Corbett) and a Japanese American (James Shigeta), fall in love with a white artist (Victoria Shaw) whom they meet in the course of the investigation. Competition brings out neuroses born from racial stress and cultural ambivalence. This is looked at head-on by Fuller and reinforced by using actual location shooting, including a chase down Little Tokyo's streets during a Japanese New Year festival. Fuller's characters are ambivalent, but the director celebrates both diversity and racial unity in a rare moment of optimism.