1964's "Coast of Skeletons" (Sanders und das Schiff des Todes or Sanders and the Ship of Death) marked one of the earliest titles on the lengthy resume of producer Harry Alan Towers, a veteran of 100 TV episodes before branching out into features with 1963's "Death Drums Along the River," introducing Richard Todd as Commissioner Harry Sanders in a West German update on Edgar Wallace's "Sanders of the River." Both Todd and Marianne Koch are back for this one off sequel, also shot on location in South Africa, where Sanders is now working for an insurance company eager to get a fix on Texas oil magnate A. J. Magnus (Dale Robertson), who appears to have switched dredging for diamonds to obtaining stolen gold bullion sunk during WW2. Heinz Drache plays a ship's captain in the employ of Magnus, determined to maintain the love of a shallow young bride (Elga Anderson) more accustomed to wealth and privilege, while Todd's Sanders continues to enjoy the company of Marianne Koch, this time as the captain's attractive photographer sister (coming off her best known film role opposite Clint Eastwood in "A Fistful of Dollars"). The varied attempts on Sanders' life aren't quite enough to evoke memories of James Bond, but it's an agreeable time passer and no more; incidentally, the title refers to the skeletons of shipwrecks! By the time this picture was issued in West Germany, Harry Alan Towers had already moved on to a new series with "The Face of Fu Manchu," his association with Christopher Lee yielding results well into the 1990s, truly an international dealmaker who also contributed to the screenplays of nearly half the more than 100 features he produced.
