The Bamboo Game

Knight ( The Tiger Game ) displays a ready command of the spoils system that plagued the Philippines during Ferdinand Marcos's regime in this convincing but somewhat slow-moving story of industrial espionage and intrigue. The disappearance of a geologist is apparently the latest in a series of attacks against Three B, a Philippine-owned mining and agriculture conglomerate. American CEO Francis Dougherty, determined to put a halt to the activities threatening his firm, calls upon troubleshooter Leo Czernik to help expose the culprits. The resourceful Czernik's vigilance enables Dougherty to piece together clues pointing to a conspiracy that involves some rogue Three B managers, a part-time warlord named Mario Tan, and rival industrialists with designs on Three B's rights to land rich with an essential strategic mineral. Eventually Czernik, with the help of some of Marcos's troops ``enlisted'' at the secret behest of the U.S. ambassador, manages to face down Tan's goons and to prove that the Marcos government was in business to do business. (Sept.)