At the centre of the film is the love story between Suzie and Robert, and it's one of the most romantic couplings I've seen in a Hollywood melodrama for a while. They don't actually get together until 2/3rds of the way through the film so the viewer feels every pang as Robert struggles with the idea of Suzie's occupation. Though Holden is twice Kwan's age- and he looks pretty old for forty- they have lovely chemistry together. He looks enchanted by Hong Kong and Suzie, yet troubled by both. It helps that both the city and Kwan are quite enchanting, though in different ways. This was Kwan's first film and she has a brilliant presence, perfectly capturing Suzie's enigmatic beauty.
As for whether the film is PC or not, the film is about Western perceptions of the West, so the stereotypes work, intercut with lots of images of the streets of Hong Kong. It's the seedy side of Hong Kong but this works in order to make Robert and Suzie's relationship all the more innocent. The racism and hypocrisy of the white ex-pats (mostly English) is clearly criticised as being such, particularly with Kay (Sylvia Sims) who has her eye on Robert and resents being passed over for a prostitute.
Perhaps the film isn't perfect but it doesn't deserve the critical mauling it got and it still has interesting things to say on how Westerners try to come to terms with other cultures and how liberalism still has tinges of racism