By Herbert Shadrak

Richard Basehart may have been the greatest American actor ever. Certainly he was too accomplished a performer ever to be “just another movie star” – his unconventional good looks and astonishing versatility allowed him to convincingly portray murderers, heels and suicidal neurotics in a career that spanned 45 years, but he was equally effective at playing gentle souls, men of action (such as the intrepid U.S. intelligence agent in Decision Before Dawn), cowboys and the heroic Admiral Harriman Nelson in the Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea science fiction series on ABC.

“Even today, Richard Basehart remains one of the great, unrecognized talents of post-war American films,” writes Mark Gross in Films in Review. “Possibly this is because he is neither conventionally handsome nor easily identifiable as a character type. Instead, he seems to become lost in his performances, belied by a surface calmness, with a subtlety underlined by a sense of abandon in his quest for realism.”

After six years knocking about Broadway, Ohio-born Basehart's breakthrough came in 1945 in The Hasty Heart, in which he was cast as a proud, dying Scottish soldier. Basehart won the 1945 New York Drama Critics Award for his realistic performance and was named the most promising newcomer of the season. Hollywood came calling, and Basehart was soon signed to a movie contract. Thus began a globe-trotting screen career that lasted until his death in 1984.

Basehart followed his cinematic debut in Repeat Performance – a 1947 “déjà-vu” thriller featuring Joan Leslie - with a supporting role in Cry Wolf (1947), an old dark house thriller starring Barbara Stanwyck, Errol Flynn and Geraldine Brooks. Basehart played Stanwyck’s younger husband, who mysteriously vanishes. 

As his Hollywood career took off, Basehart made every effort to avoid being typecast, although in his early noirs he seemed to favor parts in which he was of a villainous or conflicted nature. In preparing for his roles, Basehart spent hours by himself trying to shape the character. He would sit on the end of the couch in his living room and be so engrossed in the roles that he was completely oblivious to what was going on around him.

 

By Lee Pfeiffer

The release of Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds has thrust Enzo G. Castellari, the director of the Italian WWII pic that inspired it, back into the spotlight. This has resulted in a re-examination of his work, which has been relegated to cult status outside of his native Italy. Severin Films, which is fast becoming a major source of first-class presentations of otherwise neglected films, is honoring Castellari with the U.S. home Blu-ray DVD edition of the director's 1969 WWII adventure Eagles Over London. Even fans of Castellari's Inglorious Bastards (note the spelling difference for the Tarantino version), probably are unfamiliar with this ambitious, relatively big budget 1969 film that was a hit in Italy, but was virtually unseen in America or England. Thanks to Severin, and Tarantino, who continues to champion Castellari's work, the movie can finally be seen and judged by English-language audiences. The film is highly impressive on all levels and one realizes the frustration that Castellari must have felt in having his achievement virtually unseen outside of mainland Europe. 

By Dean Brierly

 

DETECTIVE BUREAU 2-3: GO TO HELL BASTARDS! (1963)

The early 1960s proved to be a transitional period for Japanese director Seijun Suzuki. After churning out numerous yakuza films for Nikkatsu throughout the 1950s, the director began to rebel against the creative limitations imposed by the studio. Fed up with clichéd scenarios and adherence to stylistic conventions, Suzuki began infiltrating subversive visual flourishes to make things more interesting for himself and his audiences. Nineteen-sixty-three is widely regarded as the year Suzuki fully became Suzuki, starting with Detective Bureau 2-3: Go to Hell Bastards! Although it doesn’t scale the delirious heights of the more famous Tokyo Drifter (1966) and Branded to Kill (1967)—whose visual and narrative anarchy got him fired from Nikkatsu—the film still turns the yakuza genre on its head through Suzuki’s hyperbolic approach.

Story

Jo Shisido stars as Tajima, a resourceful private eye who owns the Detective Bureau 2-3 of the title. For reasons never clearly explained, he manifests a deep-seated and simmering hate for the yakuza, an emotion that primes his motivational pump throughout the film. Following a munitions theft from an American military base, Tajima convinces the police to let him infiltrate one of two yakuza gangs battling for control of the local gun-running trade. Posing as an ex-con, he befriends a mid-level criminal named Manabe and gets close enough to the underworld hierarchy to identify the major players and the location of the guns. Even when his cover is blown, the quick-thinking detective improvises schemes to remain useful to the competing gangs—that is, until the bad guys lock him in an underground garage, pump gallons of motor oil into it and set it on fire. Tajima escapes the inferno with the aid of what has to be the world’s most powerful machinegun, then lights the fuse that ignites a battle royal between the rival gangs—a ferocious encounter fought with guns and samurai swords—that brings the film to a spectacularly convulsive conclusion.

By Lee Pfeiffer and Dave Worrall

(Cinema Retro publishers)

Cinema Retro issue #15 is now shipping in Europe. We anticipate it will arrive in the USA by mid September and will then ship to all other parts of the world. If you are a current subscriber, please remember- this is the last issue of the present season. You can re-subscribe for season 6 at any time (see subscription info below). As readers know, it pays to subscribe: you not only help us keep the dream alive (and restrict advertising in the magazine to a bare minimum), but you will be assured of never missing an issue. A glance at our back issues department illustrates that when supplies of certain issues dwindle, prices go up. Copies of sold out issues #8 and #10 have been selling for up to $75 each! A great big thank you to everyone who supported us - both our subscribers and our extremely talented contributing writers, who represent the best of the best. It's hard to believe we've completed our fifth year.

If the content of issue #15 doesn't convince you to subscribe or resubscribe, we don't know what will. Check out the following highlights:

• LEE MARVIN TRIBUTE ISSUE FEATURING RARE UNPUBLISHED 1974 INTERVIEW IN WHICH MARVIN DISCUSSES HIS KEY FILMS; PLUS STEVE MORI'S ON-LOCATION REPORT FROM THE SET OF "THE KLANSMAN" STARRING MARVIN, RICHARD BURTON, O.J. SIMPSON AND LUCIANA PALUZZI - FEATURING UNPUBLISHED BEHIND THE SCENES SET PHOTOS TAKEN BY STEVE.WE ALSO FEATURE STEVE SARAGOSSI'S TRIBUTE TO MARVIN'S BIZARRE CRIME CLASSIC "PRIME CUT"
• SIR CHRISTOPHER LEE RECALLS THE MAKING OF THE FU MANCHU MOVIES IN AN EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH JOHN EXSHAW
• BRUCE R. MARSHALL INTERVIEWS SCREENWRITER RICHARD TUGGLE ABOUT THE MAKING OF THE CLINT EASTWOOD CRIME CLASSIC "ESCAPE FROM ALCATRAZ"
• JAMES CAAN'S EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH STEVE SARAGOSSI CONTINUES WITH HIS MEMORIES OF MAKING "THE GODFATHER" AND THE SCI-FI CLASSIC "ROLLERBALL"
• SEXY SCREEN SIREN SHIRLEY ANNE FIELD TALKS TO MARK MAWSTON ABOUT HER REMARKABLE CAREER AND WORKING WITH STEVE MCQUEEN
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• DEAN BRIERLY CONCLUDES HIS SERIES ON THE ESPIONAGE FILMS OF ALISTAIR MCLEAN WITH A LOOK AT "BEAR ISLAND", "CARAVAN TO VACCARES" AND "GOLDEN RENDEZVOUS"
• CRAIG HENDERSON'S POPULAR "THE FILMS FROM U.N.C.L.E." CONTINUES WITH HIS COVERAGE OF THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E. FEATURE "THE HELICOPTER SPIES"
• TONY EARNSHAW REVEALS SOME STARTLING FACTS BEHIND THE MAKING OF "BILLY LIAR"
• RAYMOND BENSON PRESENTS HIS LIST OF THE BEST FILMS OF 1974
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Those Brits who subscribe to Cinema Retro can stop gloating over already having the latest issue of the magazine. We can now report that issue #14 arrived in the USA and was shipped immediately to all subscribers in North America. For those of you who have still not taken the plunge and subscribed, try resisting this:

• OUR 8 PAGE FILM IN FOCUS: DIRECTOR JACK CARDIFF'S CULT HIT GIRL ON A MOTORCYCLE STARRING ALAIN DELON AND MARIANNE FAITHFULL - THE FULL BEHIND-THE-SCENES STORY WITH DOZENS OF RARE, SEXY PHOTOS
• EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: OSCAR NOMINEE JAMES CAAN RECALLS HIS EARLY DAYS IN THE FILM INDUSTRY AS WELL AS MAKING EL DORADO WITH JOHN WAYNE, ROBERT MITCHUM AND HOWARD HAWKS.
• EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: OSCAR WINNER ERNEST BORGNINE RECALLS MAKING THE WILD BUNCH, WILLARD AND THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE
• EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: KAREN BLACK ON WORKING WITH ALFRED HITCHCOCK ON FAMILY PLOT
• EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: SCREENWRITER GERRY WILSON ON THE MAKING OF THE WESTERNS LAWMAN STARRING BURT LANCASTER AND CHATO'S LAND STARRING CHARLES BRONSON
• EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: CHARACTER ACTOR HARRY NORTHUP REMEMBERS HIS FRIEND STEVE MCQUEEN AND WORKING WITH SCORSESE ON TAXI DRIVER
• THE ESPIONAGE FILMS OF ALISTAIR MACLEAN PT 2 COVERS FEAR IS THE KEY, PUPPET ON A CHAIN AND WHEN EIGHT BELLS TOLL.
• THE STORY BEHIND DIRECTOR MICHAEL WINNER'S KINKY HORROR FLICK THE SENTINEL
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Cinema Retro recently caught up with Dr. Wesley Britton, author of numerous books about spy movies and TV series, including his latest work, The Encyclopedia of TV Spies.

Britton, who runs the highly entertaining web site www.spywise.net, shared his thoughts on his love of the spy movie genre.

Q: For those who haven’t heard about The Encyclopedia of TV Spies, what can readers expect to find in it?

A: Most of this book describes over 200 TV series from the U.K., the U.S, and even Canada from 1951 to the present. This isn’t an episode guide or a directory of cast and crew, but rather each alphabetical entry provides basic facts about the shows along with behind-the-scenes information to hopefully give readers some flavor of what each show was all about. It covers a wide range of series from Adam Adamant Lives to They Young Rebels, so the scope is very inclusive. It includes miniseries like Robert Ludlum’s Hades Factor, “reality” shows like Spymaster, cartoons, children’s shows, and docu-dramas based on historical events. There are also appendices discussing soundtracks and tie-in novels. The book is 520 pages long, if that gives you any idea how detailed it is.

Q: Why would readers want a book like this when so much information is on the internet?

A: My first answer to that is, because so many obscure and short-running series are included, readers will discover tons of shows they wouldn’t have known to look for. Doomwatch? The Piglet Files? Frederick Forsythe Presents? I think that’s one great pleasure from the book. I’ve already heard some readers are now seeking out DVDs of series they never knew existed because the descriptions intrigued them. I’d also say to be careful about what you find on the net. Interviewing some of the participants, I picked up a number of errors repeated all over the place. In addition, I’ve already done that research for you—along with interviews, books, rare articles, you name it. For many series, all you can really find are episode titles and lists of cast and crew. I wanted to go beyond that, Again, trying to provide some flavor of each series thinking those who like certain types of shows will get interested in seeing programs new to them.

I’ll admit that if you’re looking for information about major series like I Spy or The Avengers, there’s no lack of other sources you can explore. In an encyclopedia, my discussions of these series have to be limited because of space. But I do have my own spin on things. For example, I include shows like The Adventures of Zorro and Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea and explain how they do, believe it or not, connect to the spy genre.

Spy movie enthusiast Jason Whiton has launched a major new web site dedicated to those great espionage movies and TV series of the 1960s. The site is pretty addictive, as the initial offerings include rare interview footage of Patrick McGoohan, reproductions of pages from Man From U.N.C.L.E. comic books, rare 45 rpm photo sleeves from the James Bond movies, a tribute to Michael Caine's Harry Palmer series and a contest in which you can win an entire collection of Get Smart videos. A very welcome addition to the cyber space universe. Click here to indulge. 

Film journalist Mike Malloy remembers the scrupled actor

Most movie-star hopefuls enter the entertainment industry knowing full well they will have to scratch and claw out a career for themselves in ways that compromise their previously held values. This is not to say they’ll necessarily cheat and backstab to make it in The Biz (it often comes to that), but they certainly won’t turn down precious advancement opportunities on moral grounds.

Recently deceased, thoughtful thesp Patrick McGoohan (“The Prisoner,” Ice Station Zebra, Braveheart, “Secret Agent”) found a different route to stardom, one that reflected his very principled beliefs. And because he made choices detrimental to his fame—he could’ve been 007, after all—and yet became an international film and TV star nonetheless, one would like to believe his was an irrepressible talent that shone through despite the actor’s lack of career-mindedness.

The eponymous role in Henrik Ibsen’s play Brand was considered the definitive role of McGoohan’s 1950s career. He played the part both on the London stage and, fortunately for posterity, for a BBC broadcast that has been released as a PAL DVD. It’s little wonder that the character—a priest who took his principles to new heights and extremes (“Unless you give all, you give nothing!”)—fit the actor like a glove; he was soon proving that he too lived according to a distinct personal code. Shortly thereafter, McGoohan declined the role of James Bond, reportedly citing moral objections.

McGoohan’s passing on the 007 part came as the franchise’s first feature—1962’s Dr. No—was being developed, and almost all accounts had him disliking the spy’s brutish use of force and sexual promiscuity. This version of events is certainly reinforced by examining McGoohan’s 1960s television breakthrough of “Danger Man” (which was actually two different British shows of the same name, the latter of which ran as “Secret Agent” stateside). McGoohan’s spy character, John Drake, was a more-brains-than-brawn agent who wasn’t seen to carry a gun or kill a man (although each episode had its requisite fistfight) and wasn’t caught bedding a woman onscreen.

Even if Drake was the sanitized version of Bond, McGoohan cut a suave, intelligent figure—and one with the ability to summon up a tremendously forceful dialogue delivery when needed (the American-born, Irish-raised actor perhaps possessed the small screen’s most intimidating bark of toughguyspeak). It was therefore little surprise that McGoohan was reportedly offered the Bond role again, sometime in the late ‘60s and/or early ‘70s (which certainly fits with the Connery-Lazenby-Connery tumult the film series was undergoing). A second refusal of 007 has even more significance, as McGoohan would have then certainly understood the extent of riches and fame he was forgoing (even if the Bond series was at its shakiest point, being terribly out of step with the era’s counterculture).

Instead of Bond, McGoohan launched another television project in the late ‘60s—this time of his own conception. In the 17-part mini-series “The Prisoner,” he not only starred but also occasionally directed and wrote (usually pseudonymously). Often described as “television’s first masterpiece,” the show boasted a plot—about a spy who tries to resign but who is instead whisked away to a secret island where a bizarre society tries to break his spirit and crack open his head full of espionage secrets—that functioned as a brilliant allegory exposing the dangers of conformity and group culture. Some of the episodes, including the absurd finale, were too nonsensical (it was the hippy-dippy late ‘60s, mind you), but the better ones rank right up with Ayn Rand in their power to promote the idea of individualism. McGoohan had used the Bond-fueled fluffy spy craze to create something of importance.

A bit of negative personal information regarding McGoohan came from the set of the 1979 Clint Eastwood vehicle Escape from Alcatraz, when the joke was born that McGoohan, who was boozing during production, couldn’t be doubled in a hand close-up, because director Don Siegel couldn’t find another actor who had the shakes that bad. It’s been suggested the actor was drinking to protect against the bitter cold, but we fans rationalize that any drinking resulted from the burden of genius of the man who created “The Prisoner.”

“Genius” is not a stretch, but “principled to the point of career injury” is rock-solid certain. Circa 1997, a fan-made Patrick McGoohan webshrine existed, containing reprints of rare interviews with the generally reclusive actor. Although your humble writer was then new to the Internet, he quickly zeroed in on the site and checked back regularly. Then one day in the late ‘90s, the site bore a message that it would cease to operate, as McGoohan himself had contacted the webmaster and requested the removal of all content. This was possibly another instance of McGoohan’s preference for privacy, but it’s not hard to imagine the actor having a disdain for idol worship of pop-cultural figures too.

On a more personal note, your writer got a phone call from McGoohan in 2002, in response to an interview request for an “almost 007” article—in fact, the only returned phone call received in connection with the piece. Sure, it could’ve been the sturdy Irish name of Mike Malloy that prompted McGoohan to phone (he declined to comment about “events that happened 40 years ago” but graciously accepted my nervous, short-of-breath praise of his career), but the actor didn’t have to bother with some journalist writing a spec piece. But he did, and it’s nice to imagine a returned phone call out of courtesy (and general obligation to one’s fellow man) was his standard operating procedure.

Maybe it’s just as well that he shuffled off this mortal coil earlier this week. Today’s world is such that a crass, shallow fame anthem like The Pussycat Dolls’ “When I Grow Up” can instruct tweens to aim at stardom for the spoils of “nice cars and groupies.” There’s little room for understanding a Patrick McGoohan, who acted because he excelled at the craft but who accepted projects with guidance from his personal convictions. And if AMC TV’s remake of “The Prisoner” serves ultimately to dilute the power of the original when it airs later this year, it’s best that Patrick McGoohan departs dearly now.

 

BY TOM LISANTI

“Hi, I’m Plenty,” said Lana Wood to Sean Connery’s James Bond at the gaming tables of Las Vegas in Diamonds Are Forever (1971).  “Plenty O’Toole.”  Glancing at her cleavage, Bond wittily deadpanned, “But of course you are.”  With this small exchange audiences were introduced to one of the most popular Bond girls to ever hit the screen.  As Plenty, Lana Wood was finally able to step out of the shadow of her sister Natalie Wood.  On screen for only a few scenes, she almost steals the movie with her amusing performance and remains forever remembered for this role.  “Isn’t that bizarre,” exclaims Wood with a laugh.  “I’m only in the movie for three minutes! 

Lana Wood was born Svetlana Zacharenko Gurdin in Santa Monica, California.  She followed her older sister into the acting profession and made her film debut at eight years old in John Ford’s classic western The Searchers (1956).  Wood received good notices and went on to appear in a few television dramas with Jack Lemmon and Charlton Heston, among others.  But unlike Natalie, Lana didn’t want to act as a child and she waited until she was eighteen before re-starting her career with an episode of Dr. Kildare.  More alluring and voluptuous than Natalie, Lana found herself typed cast in sexpot roles.  After playing a coed in The Girls on the Beach (1965), Wood was signed to play sexy Eula Harker in the short-lived soap opera The Long, Hot Summer (1965-66).  When the series was cancelled midway through its first season, 20th Century-Fox immediately moved Lana Wood into their hit soap opera Peyton Place.  As Sandy Webber, a slinky temptress from the wrong side of the tracks, Wood was an immediate hit with the viewers and played the role for close to two years.

After playing a swinging bachelorette in For Singles Only (1968) and a mini-skirted biker babe in Free Grass (1969), Wood posed semi-nude for Playboy magazine.  Her pictorial appeared in the April 1971 issue along accompanied by some of her poetry.  These photos indirectly helped Wood land her most famous role of Plenty O’Toole.   “I didn’t have to audition per se for this role,” recalls Lana.  “My dear friend [writer] Tom Mankiewicz told me that Cubby Broccoli was looking for an actress to play this character named Plenty O’Toole.  Tom thought I would be perfect for it.  He asked me if I would meet with Cubby.  I said, ‘Absolutely!’  I was en route to do a movie called A Place Called Today in New York.  Before leaving for that, I went in to chat with Cubby who was adorable!  I tried to look as tall as humanly possible because Tom had told me that they were thinking of Plenty O’Toole as this giant of a woman in every way.  For me that wasn’t easy—I’m only five feet, four inches—but those were the days of hot pants and really high heels. I didn’t hear anything until I started filming the other picture.  I was thrilled to get the part!”

In Diamonds Are Forever (1971), secret agent James Bond (Sean Connery) is assigned to pose as a diamond smuggler, leading him and jewel thief Tiffany Case (Jill St. John), from Amsterdam to Las Vegas, in pursuit of fifty thousand carats of diamonds.  Bond meets bar girl Plenty O’Toole and her cleavage at a crap tables in a Vegas casino.  After introducing herself to Bond who has been winning he takes her up to his room.  Their tryst is interrupted as thugs try to kill Bond and toss Plenty out the fifteen-story window.  (“We filmed this at night.  I was topless.  The crowd got a nice view of me in nothing but a pair of pale blue panties.”)  Fortunately, Plenty lands in the hotel’s pool.  Unfortunately, a short time later she is discovered murdered and floating face down in Tiffany’s pool.

Remembering working with Sean Connery, Lana remarks, “He is very charming and attentive. He was very relaxed and was very easy to work with.  As long as we did things in a rapid pace so he could get out to golf then he was fine.  But I had no problems working with Sean at all.  Later on we heard that he was battling with the producers during the shoot.  If that was true it wasn’t in front of the cast or crew.”  Lana also admits to having a brief “interlude” with her sexy leading man.

With the special edition DVD release, fans got to see a number of Wood’s scenes that were excised from the final print due to “running time.”  One shows the sexual attraction growing between Bond and Plenty as they dine before going up to his hotel room and another featured Plenty sneaking back into Bond’s room only to find him in bed with Tiffany.  “I was flabbergasted that they cut all this out,” exclaims Lana.  “I didn’t even realize it until I had come back from a world tour to promote the film.  I went to the Grauman’s Chinese Theatre in Hollywood to watch it with a friend because I was so busy I never had time to see it.  I literally bent over to get some popcorn as the thugs threw me out the window and by the time I had straightened up my character was dead.  I thought, ‘Wow, all of a sudden I have this little part.’  I actually asked why they cut most of my scenes and I was told that they didn’t have much relevance to the plot.”  Not so.  These missing scenes finally explain how and why Plenty O’Toole is found murdered in Tiffany Case’s swimming pool wearing her wig.  The assassins mistook her for Tiffany and killed her. 

It was foolish to cut these scenes and considering how much better Wood was in the movie than Jill St. John who clad in an ill-fitting bikini throughout most of the movie gives a shrill performance (though the overrated redhead incredulously keeps making the Top 10 Bond Girls of all-time polls), the producers probably kicked themselves for shortening Wood’s screen time.

- Read more about Bond girls and other spy chicks in Tom Lisanti’s Film Fatales: Women in Espionage Films and Television, 1962-1973 (co-authored by Louis Paul) available at www.sixtiescinema.com. .

Criterion continues to earn its reputation as the gold standard among DVD distributors with its new release of a special edition of the 1965 classic The Spy Who Came in From the Cold.

The acclaimed film was based on John Le Carre's first novel, which he wrote under a pseudonym because of sensitivities relating to his work for British Intelligence. Le Carre was "outed", however, and the revelation turned out to be a blessing, catapulting him to the top ranks of thriller writers. The film had a tortured history, as outlined in the special edition DVD. Director Martin Ritt had initially considered Burt Lancaster to star, with the story rewritten to make him a disgruntled member of Canadian Intelligence. Fortunately that plan fell through, as the British background to the story is essential to its effectiveness. Ultimately, Richard Burton was cast - though it necessitated that most of the film be shot in Ireland in order to accomodate the limited number of days Burton could work in England without incurring severe tax penalties. Burton resented Ritt from the start, perhaps because the director held firm in his insistence that Burton play down his tendency to be overly theatrical. The two men rarely spoke except on the set, and at one point Le Carre was brought to the set to act as a referee between them. At one crucial point, Burton walked off the set and had to be coaxed out of his dressing room. As sometimes happens during such adversarial situations, a classic film emerged and Burton received an Oscar-nominated performance. 

The film is a complex but mesmerizing Cold War thriller with Burton cast as Alec Leamas, a depressed and disgruntled field agent who has become sickened by his chosen profession. Numb to any human feeling, he leads a solitary existence while barely tolerating his superior officer (Cyril Cusack, playing the role with such dispassion it makes for a chilling impression). Leamas' cynicism is thought to be advantageous to MI6, as it might convince the Soviets that he is ready to defect. An elaborate scheme is concocted in which Leamas is allowed to be recruited by the enemy - with the ultimate objective of being brought to East Berlin where he will give disinformation designed to ruin their top spy master (Peter Van Eyck). Along the way, Leamas reluctantly recruits a British left-wing activist (Claire Bloom) as part of the scheme, feigning a romantic interest in her. The plot eventually features more twists and turns than a roller coaster and one must pay close attention or become hopelessly confused. However, the film is a mesmerizing experience - especially the sequences set behind the Iron Curtain in which Leamas finds himself giving testimony at a kangaroo trial orchestrated by his target's main rival in the KGB (a superb Oskar Werner). The finale is as surprising as it is unconventional and has a shattering emotional impact.

The film excels on all levels, from Oswald Morris' outstanding black-and-white cinematography that makes London appear as drab and uninviting as East Berlin; Anthony Harvey's editing, the screenplay by Paul Dehn and Guy Trosper;  the supporting performances including Bloom, Sam Wanamaker, Rupert Davies, Bernard Lee ("M" from the 007 films) and Michael Hordern (particularly good as an aging homosexual agent who suffers humiliation at the hands of his superior), and Sol Kaplan's sobering score.

The film was released in 1965 when the cinemas were awash with James Bond films and the endless waves of 007 "wanna-be" movies. Spy stood out from the rest of the pack due to its daring unglamorous look at the world of real life espionage - a point made by Leamas when he states that agents are generally life's losers who have failed to fit in with any normal aspect of society. The script did cause some controversy because it depicts the methods used by both the East and West indistinguishable in their brutality. Although the movie received outstanding reviews, it was only a modest box-office success, though its reputation has increased over the decades.

Criterion's 2-DVD special edition features a terrific transfer as well as some impressive extras. Cinematographer Oswald Morris (who sounds a bit like Alfred Hitchcock) gives fascinating insights into key sequences; there is a new interview with Le Carre in which he speaks candidly about the tensions on the film as well as aspects of it that have always displeased him; a somewhat dry but nevertheless informative  BBC documentary from the year 2000 in which Le Carre is interviewed at his country estate and reflects back on his entire career; a 1985 audio interview of Martin Ritt by film historian Patrick Milligan; original set design drawings and the theatrical trailer. There is also a rare 1967 British TV show in which Richard Burton is interviewed by Kenneth Tynan. It's a fascinating time capsule, with both men smoking like chimneys as the dour Burton discusses the hits and misses of his career. In a moment of great candor, he says that his main motivation is to simply get the best tables at restaurants and the other benefits that accompany being a celebrity.It was this emphasis on the shallow rewards of stardom that would ultimately largely derail Burton's career.The set also features an illustrated booklet with extensive liner notes by film critic Michael Sragow.

Bring this Spy in from the cold and make it an essential part of your video library. - Lee Pfeiffer

CLICK HERE TO ORDER FROM AMAZON

Most people's perception of secret agent Matt Helm was derived from the four 1960s big screen feature films starring Dean Martin as a thinly-veiled Hugh Hefner, mixing sexual escapes, hi tech gadgets and puns that qualify as guilty pleasures. However, those films were always a thorn in the side of purists who were dedicated to the real Matt Helm, whose adventures they enjoyed in the pages of the novels written by Donald Hamilton, who passed away in 2006. Matt Helm: The Unofficial Homepage offers interesting insights and articles pertaining to the literary aspect of the Sixties superspy - and he's a far cry from Dino's interpretation. Hamilton created his hero as a serious persona who engaged in gritty espionage work with nary a Slaygirl in sight. To visit the site, click here.

On October 17, Sir Roger Moore was flown by helicopter to Bletchley Park, the famed British mansion enshrined in history as the spy HQ where the German code was broken during WWII. Sir Roger's mission: to meet with press from around the world to promote the new release of Fox's Blu-ray editions of Dr. No, From Russia With Love, Die Another Day, For Your Eyes Only, Live and Let Die and Thunderball. Cinema Retro publishers Dave Worrall and Lee Pfeiffer were also hired by Fox to meet with the press and share their knowledge of Bond lore with international TV stations. Adding to the fun was the display of classic Aston Martins and other vehicles brought by Peter Nelson, owner of the Cars of the Stars Museum. The press sessions lasted for hours and featured appearances by some of real espionage heroes : the surviving code breakers.

By Dean Brierly

Alexander Mundy: “Let me get this straight…I can catch complete episodes of the entire first season of It Takes a Thief on hulu.com?”

Noah Bain: “Not quite, Al. But how does 14 out of the first 16 grab you?”

Alexander Mundy: “Terrific!”

Nobody could lay as hip an inflection on the word “terrific” as Robert Wagner when he starred as Alexander Mundy in the coolest adventure/espionage series of the late sixties, It Takes a Thief. During the show’s three-year run from 1968 to 1970, the suave and sophisticated Wagner was the hottest thing going, even edging James Coburn (temporarily, at least) in the hippest actor sweepstakes. As anyone among the Cinema Retro generation knows, Mundy was a world-class thief whose one mistake landed him in San Jobel Prison. The man who put him there? Noah Bain, head of a shadowy government spy agency known as the SIA. In the show’s pilot episode, Bain offered Mundy an expedient if unconventional way out: steal for the government in exchange for a full pardon. Along with the gig came a cover identity that appealed to every man’s inner hedonist: Mundy would pose as an international playboy replete with swank estate and a succession of beautiful SIA operatives to assist him. The catch was a Big Brother surveillance system inside the mansion and strict orders to keep hands off the girls. Needless to say, Mundy routinely circumvented the SIA cameras and subverted whatever scruples the ladies possessed.

When he wasn’t macking on Bain’s private reserve, Mundy kept busy pulling off a string of high wire capers in the world’s hottest jet set locations—all without breaking a sweat. Unlike the preening poseurs currently afflicting Hollywood, Wagner’s cool was organic and understated. As Alexander Mundy, he projected a breezy self-assurance untainted by arrogance or condescension, and maintained his sangfroid in the face of the most dangerous assignments Noah Bain threw his way, thanks to an unparalleled and seemingly inexhaustible skill set. Mundy could neutralize any security system, crack any safe, outwit any adversary and, not least, talk his way into the arms of just about any woman in sight. Little wonder he was the envy of every kid who came of age during the show’s original run.

As an actor, Wagner had been building up to this breakout role throughout the 1960s. The first intimation of his Al Mundy persona can be glimpsed in The Pink Panther (1963), in which he plays the smooth, womanizing nephew of jewel thief David Niven. When he discovers his uncle’s cat burglar kit midway through the film, one can almost sense the actor’s dawning realization of his future career path. Wagner followed up with strong performances in Harper (1966), How I Spent My Summer Vacation (1967) and Banning (1967), each role adding further gloss to his onscreen charisma. By the time Wagner did the pilot episode (titled Magnificent Thief), his combination of physical grace and urbane demeanor was smoother than a shaken-not-stirred vodka martini.

As great as Wagner was, however, It Takes a Thief wouldn’t have been half as effective without the powerful presence of Malachi Throne as Noah Bain. Who can forget Noah's immortal line during the scintillating split-screen credit sequence set to Dave Grusin’s badass theme tune: “Oh, look, Al, I’m not asking you to spy, just asking you to steal.” The stage-trained actor with the deep, distinctive voice was all over the cult TV map during the 1960s and ’70s. With his burly physique and stolid, slab-like face, Throne excelled at playing gruff authority figures, yet his keen intelligence and surprisingly wide emotional range added fascinating layers to his performances. The potent onscreen chemistry he and Wagner displayed gave a real edge to their characters' adversarial relationship. Bain was a hard ass with a ruthless streak and frequently threatened to ship Mundy back to prison if he stepped out line. Yet he also maintained a healthy respect for Mundy’s criminal talents, as well as a grudging affection for the master crook himself. And in his own conservative way, Noah Bain was kind of hip too, matching Mundy in glib repartee and delightedly quashing his amorous aspirations at every opportunity. In the episode “When Thieves Fall In,” Bain surprises Mundy and a female SIA operative in a forbidden clinch. “We were just playing chess,” the flustered agent explains. “You’re lucky I arrived in time,” Bain retorts. “One more move and he’d have had you mated.”

Throne’s complexity and grit were sorely missed when he left the series after the first two seasons. Edward Binns did a competent job as Mundy’s new boss Wally Powers, but he just couldn't match the Malachi Man. Ironically, it was Throne’s own rebellious streak that resulted in his leaving the show. “They had this idea of shooting the whole season in Italy, but they wanted me to stay behind and give Wagner’s character…orders over the phone. I told them if I didn’t go I’d quit, and I did. The show didn’t last another half a season.”

Unlike some programs that take time to dial in their formula, It Takes a Thief was perfect right out of the box. The show’s basic premise, fusing the heist and espionage genres, was a stroke of mad genius. Watching Mundy conduct his felonious pursuit of secret documents, jewels, missing scientists and whatever else the SIA needed stolen was fascinating in itself, but the spy tropes worked into the mix made things even more intriguing, giving the writers greater creative latitude to explore fresh narrative directions. As a result, Mundy could channel the larcenous vibe of Cary Grant in To Catch a Thief while simultaneously tapping into the Cold War dramatics of such contemporaneous shows as I Spy and Mission: Impossible. But no matter which way the scenarios swung, they were all invested with the kind of light touch that seems impossible to reproduce today. All three seasons maintained a nicely judged balance of humor and drama, never veering into camp (like The Man From U.N.C.L.E. did during its third season) or becoming overly serious.

Despite its iconic status and the respect it commands from legions of faithful fans, It Takes a Thief, for reasons known only to the Home Entertainment Gods, has yet to appear on DVD. When one considers that seemingly every other television show from that era has made it to DVD (including the most mindless retro rubbish imaginable), one has to wonder what license holder Universal Studios is waiting for. Fans looking to get their fill of Mundy’s adventures have had to make do with videotapes or gray market DVD-Rs of dubious quality—until now. The good folks at www.hulu.com, a free video streaming site founded by NBC Universal and News Corp., have stepped into the breach by making available 14 season one episodes in their entirety, with limited commercial interruptions.

Many fans consider the first season the best of the three. The stories were more inventive, the suspense was wound a little tighter, and the humor shaded a bit darker. (Here’s Mundy’s sardonic take on an East European security official: “The cat with the ball-bearing eyes is the man currently starring in the Baltic police department’s theater of cruelty.”) The Mundy-Bain interplay was also at its most contentious and compelling (although this aspect became slightly diluted when Mundy became a freelance operative in the second season). Even the faux European locales, courtesy of Universal’s back lot, don’t detract from the show’s sophisticated, escapist allure. Watching episodes like “Turnabout,” “The Radomir Miniature” and “Locked in the Cradle of the Keep” is to be reminded of a vanished entertainment era that privileged intelligence, wit and style.

The program’s celebrated guest stars also made memorable impressions during the 1968 season. In “To Steal a Battleship,” Bill Bixby plays a rival thief who muscles in on Al’s assignment, mistakenly believing they’re both after a priceless necklace, when in fact Mundy is interested only in recovering NATO defense documents. Bixby is excellent as the conniving competitor, adding some darker colors to his standard nice-guy persona. Season one also featured two of Susan Saint James’ five guest appearances as Charlene “Charlie” Brown, another fellow thief and Al’s occasional love interest. In the aforementioned “When Thieves Fall In,” Mundy must steal a sable coat with a map of I.C.B.M. missile sites sewn into the lining, and so enlists Charlie’s help to pull a double switch. St. James and Wagner spark off one another like erotic electrons in this episode while trading one-liners with the timing of a seasoned comedy team. Mundy: “What happened?” Charlene Brown: “Chloroform with a vodka chaser.” Mundy: “You’re not supposed to spray that stuff on yourself!”

Such exchanges are typical of the series’ unbeatable mix of action, suspense, humor and that elusive and seemingly out of fashion quality known as style. Short of Robert Wagner once again donning his cat burglar garb and breaking into Universal’s corporate black tower to liberate the original copies of It Takes a Thief, Hulu will likely remain the best place to indulge your fix of this television classic. Here’s hoping that seasons two and three will soon follow, so that Alexander Mundy fans everywhere will have further occasion to say, “Terrific!”

Review: I Hear No Bugles By Robert Winston Mercy. (Merriam Press, 2008)

By Wesley Britton

Even in the first days of the silent movie era, film producers knew well the value of celluloid stories as propaganda. Before World War I, those opposed to America’s involvement overseas cranked out tragic tales designed to discourage any support for the then feared “Merchants of Death.” Just as quickly, once war was declared, Hollywood shifted gears and found itself a major contributor to recruitment drives. Scripts now starred small-town heroes including little girls exposing saboteurs in Grandpa’s lab and high-flying aviators shooting down fellow aces, all part of the vital effort to crush the Wiley “Huns” at home and abroad.

From that point forward, war movies resonated with the themes of valor, glory, and stoic self-sacrifice in which anyone anywhere could find themselves elevated morally and spiritually by doing their patriotic duty. Onscreen, whether battling Southern rebels, Indian tribes in the Old West, or German U-Boats, a soldier’s life was something to aspire to, yearn for, and a glorious death on the battlefield was preferable to returning home to a devoted sweetheart without having come of age in the trenches. The impact of so many films with these motifs is immeasurable, especially on the “Greatest Generation” which was moved into action as much by the gallant epics they saw in theatres as well as the newsreels shown after Pearl Harbor.

One story from these times is unique. The opening pages of a new memoir by Robert Winston Mercy, I Hear No Bugles, begins with scenes of a young American drawn into a soldier’s life due to what he had seen in moviehouses. Then, we learn about the life of a front-line infantryman in North Korea discovering just how war was never what was shown in dark auditoriums. Then, bringing his story full circle, Robert Winston Mercy came home to become first a stunt-man and then a contract player at MGM playing the very roles he’d grown up watching, only this time as military commanders in TV series like Combat!, Maverick, and Playhouse 90.

The first paragraph of I Hear No Bugles makes Mercy’s thesis clear:

“The effects of propaganda films cannot be underestimated, particularly in this era of contending political and religious dogmas that relentlessly threaten to make this century even more unimaginably bloodier than the last. Indisputably, film is second to literacy in the intellectual, philosophical and moral development of the human species. The defunct uniformed `press-gangs’ of history that `Shanghaied’ young men into military service have been supplanted by the more subtly hypnotic persuasion of TV and the movies. Every image, symbol and mode of, each delivered word is meticulously crafted to extract the desired emotional and moral support from its national audience. Those ships, planes, submarines, helicopters, tanks and the expended ammunitions of the armies of soldiers we see on the screen are freely given to the studios for that explicit purpose.”

Battle for Bond Redux: Robert Sellers’s Thunderball Book Returns

By Wesley Britton

To put my proverbial cards on the table, since 1995, I didn’t think any book in print matched Andrew Lycett’s Ian Fleming: The Man Behind James Bond for providing authoritative history, biography, and background into how 007 came to be. Then, in 2007, Robert Sellers gave us The Battle for Bond: The Genesis of Cinema’s Greatest Hero. It became the second most important book in my Bond collection. Drawing from many previously unknown primary sources, most notably court records held by Sylvan Whittingham Mason, Sellers shared how the idea of bringing Bond to film began and the unexpected and complex sequence of events that followed. Not a perfect book by any means, but one belonging in every film lover’s library.

Perhaps it was appropriate that publishing a book dealing so much with legal twists and turns ended up mirroring its subject. Because anything associated with Ian Fleming is closely controlled by various heirs of the legacy, some publishers wanted nothing to do with Battle for Bond. Then small British publisher Tomahawk took up the challenge, and Battle for Bond enjoyed deserved critical praise for telling a story that had been clouded in myth and speculation for decades. Then the Ian Fleming Will Trust stepped in.

In an interview for James Bond Magazine (The Battle for Bond Rages On), Sellers noted, “Pretty quickly after the book was published the Ian Fleming Will Trust, through their London lawyers, took great exception to our publishing, in full, copies of a number of letters by Ian Fleming, to which the Trust owned copyright. They really were not best pleased, and notified us that we had infringed their copyright and were liable for damages.”

The letters in question were copies of court documents involved in the first lawsuits filed by Kevin McClory and Jack Whittingham regarding ownership of Thunderball and the creation of the cinematic 007. “We, that’s the publisher and I,” Robert told 007 Magazine, “claimed that we had every right to reproduce these documents in the book without infringing copyright as they were used as part of the prosecution case in the 1963 Ian Fleming plagiarism trial. We also believed ourselves to be protected by law, since section 45, subsection 2 of the Copyright Designs and Patents Act of 1988 states that it is not an infringement of copyright if the publication of documents occurs within the context of reporting legal proceedings, which clearly is the case with this book.”

Whatever the legal merits, historians and small-presses don’t have the resources to defend themselves against such suits, so in March 2008 Sellers and Tomahawk agreed to allow the Fleming Trust to pulp the remaining 300 copies of the book in England. This didn’t affect the first edition in the U.S. where copies quickly became something of a new 007 collector’s item. Just as quickly, Sellers announced a new edition would be coming out without the offending photographs in mid-June 2008.

Bradford Dillman: A Compulsively Watchable Actor

By Herb Shadrak

In a career that has spanned 43 years, Bradford Dillman accumulated more than 500 film and TV credits. The slim, handsome and patrician Dillman may have been the busiest actor in Hollywood during the late sixties and early seventies, working non-stop for years. In 1971 alone, Dillman starred in seven full-length feature films. And this protean output doesn’t include guest appearances on six TV shows that same year.

Yale-educated Dillman first drew good notices in the early 1950s on the Broadway stage and in live TV shows, such as Climax and Kraft Television Theatre. After making theatrical history playing Edmund Tyrone in the first-ever production of Eugene O’Neill’s Long Day’s Journey into Night in 1956, Dillman landed the role of blueblood psychopath Artie Straus in the crime-and-punishment thriller Compulsion (1959), for which he won a three-way Best Actor Prize at Cannes (sharing the award with co-stars Dean Stockwell and Orson Welles).

On the And You Call Yourself a Scientist! Web site, Dillman’s Artie Straus is described as “all brag and bravado, contemptuous of everything but himself, with his bridge-and-country-club parents, and his vaguely unwholesome relationship with his mother.”

In the early years of his career, Dillman starred in several major motion pictures, picking and choosing his roles carefully. He was featured in Jean Negulesco’s romance A Certain Smile (1958) with Rossano Brazzi and Joan Fontaine; Philip Dunne’s World War II drama In Love and War (1958) with Robert Wagner and Dana Wynter; and Tony Richardson’s Sanctuary (1961) with Lee Remick and Yves Montand, a rancid slice of Southern Gothic based on the novel by William Faulkner.

Yet in the early sixties, Dillman started taking any part that came along to support his growing family. From 1962 on, he guest starred in dozens of TV series -- among them Espionage, Kraft Suspense Theatre, Twelve O’Clock High, Shane, Felony Squad, The Man from U.N.C.L.E., Marcus Welby, M.D., The Streets of San Francisco, Bronk, How the West Was Won and Fantasy Island.

In 1975, Dillman won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Actor in a Daytime Drama Special for his performance as Matt Clifton in Last Bride of Salem (1974), an excellent tale of modern witchcraft. The 90-minute Gothic horror movie aired on ABC Afternoon Playbreak and was so well received that it was rebroadcast during primetime.

Over the years, Dillman appeared in scores of made-for-TV movies and theatrical releases, such as Walter Grauman’s drama A Rage to Live (1965) with the late Suzanne Pleshette; John Guillermin’s war story The Bridge at Remagen (1969) with George Segal; Hy Averback’s satire Suppose They Gave a War and Nobody Came (1970) starring Tony Curtis; and Jud Taylor’s horror-thriller Revenge (1971), with Shelley Winters. Dillman also played a psychiatrist who goes ape for Natalie Trundy in Don Taylor’s Escape from the Planet of the Apes (1971) and a scientist battling firestarting cockroaches in Jeannot Szwarc’s Bug (1975) — the final film produced by legendary horror schlockmeister William Castle.

Dillman is now 78. After retiring from acting in 1995, he took up a second career as a writer. He is excellent at his new avocation, requiring no ghostwriters to tweak his prose. Dillman’s autobiography Are You Anybody? is a series of amusing anecdotes about his Hollywood years. He has also written a harrowing adventure tale entitled That Air Forever Dark, set in Papua New Guinea and Indonesia. “It’s a terrifying account of the Jet Age meeting the Stone Age – Deliverance in a jungle setting,” the actor-turned-author says.

Dillman’s latest book, published in 2005 by Fithian Press, is a comedy of errors entitled Kissing Kate. “The novel is about an amateur production of Kiss Me Kate,” Dillman relates. “An out-of-work professional actor is hired to play the male lead opposite a wealthy community icon. Ultimately, of course, they end up in bed together, where a ‘catastrophe’ occurs and all hell breaks loose. I assure you that Kissing Kate is not in the least bit autobiographical!”

Fifty-two years after appearing on stage in O’Neill’s landmark theatrical event, Dillman is now a playwright as well. His Seeds in the Wind made its debut in May 2007 at the Rubicon Theatre Company in Ventura, California. The play is set in 1939 in Santa Cruz, California, during a weekend celebrating the 40th birthday of a society hostess' daughter. The interaction of the houseguests is both humorous and dramatic, and all manner of unexpected events occur, Dillman assures us.

The veteran performer spoke to Cinema Retro from his home in Santa Barbara, California.

Cinema Retro: You achieved international prominence in Richard Fleischer’s Compulsion, in which you were unforgettable as the frightening and magnetic Artie Straus, a wealthy law-school student on trial for murder in this taut retelling of the infamous Leopold-Loeb case of the 1920s. You had been playing romantic leads up until then, so this leap into villainy was quite a daring career move on your part.

Bradford Dillman: I had a commitment to Twentieth Century Fox to do two pictures a year and, as fate would have it, the timing of the filming of Compulsion coincided. Nothing to do with the moguls’ belief that I had talent. It was just dumb luck, pure and simple.

CR: Following Compulsion, you were often cast in villainous roles. In 1964, you co-starred with B-movie cult figure John Ashley (The Mad Doctor of Blood Island) in an episode of Dr. Kildare with the intriguing title Night of the Beast. What was that one about?

BD: I was the beast. I was such a bad guy I had my thugs hold Kildare down while I raped his girlfriend in front of his very eyes. When we came to the comeuppance scene, I learned that Richard Chamberlain had obviously never been in a fistfight in his life. The stunt men couldn't teach him how to throw a punch; I couldn't teach him. So we had a gentle comeuppance. He's a nice, sensitive man who has since come out of the closet.

CR: In 1967, you were the guest villain on The Prince of Darkness Affair, a two-part episode of The Man from U.N.C.L.E, later repackaged as a theatrical release – The Helicopter Spies (1968). You were great fun as Luther Sebastian, the Third Way cult leader who steals a rocket. Did you have any scenes with lovely Lola Albright?

BD: The Helicopter Spies has disappeared in the vortex of remaining brain cells. I don’t remember if I exchanged words with Lola Albright.

Cinema Retro's Dean Brierly serves up another fascinating, exclusive interview.

The Martin Woodhouse Interview

By Dean Brierly

PROLOGUE

Perhaps the most potent evocation of the 1960s was the book “Goodbye Baby and Amen,” with pictures by David Bailey and words by Peter Evans. Published in 1969, it paid stylish homage to the decade’s cultural icons and iconoclasts: from Jean Shrimpton to Terence Stamp, Christine Keeler to Marianne Faithfull, the Rolling Stones to the Brothers Kray. It’s a perfect tribute as well as a perfect time capsule. Well, nearly perfect. There is one glaring omission. Chap by the name of Martin Woodhouse.

If that name doesn’t immediately set bells of recognition pealing, it’s not because his CV is unworthy of inclusion in the decade’s creative pantheon. Woodhouse first drew notice in 1957-58 as a research scholar at Cambridge, where he built one of the world’s first pure logic computers. During the next two years, he did pioneering research on anti-aircraft missile-control systems while serving as a pilot in the Royal Air Force. Upon being demobilized, he joined his brother Hugh in writing all the first-season episodes of the Supermarionation TV series Supercar. (Who can forget such characters as Mike Mercury, Mitch the Monkey and Dr. Horatio Beaker, who was famous for taking forever to finish a sentence and spouting the catchphrase: “Satisfactory. Most satisfactory!”) Woodhouse subsequently graduated to writing for real actors, contributing a number of sparkling scripts for The Avengers that helped instill the show’s surreal, science fiction ambience and Cathy Gale’s fully liberated character. He penned a series of brilliant espionage thrillers between 1966 and 1976 featuring research scientist-turned reluctant spy Giles Yeoman (and his occasional CIA sidekick Yancy Brightwell). To top it off, mystery writer and critic Dorothy B. Hughes famously dubbed him “a swinger.”

Woodhouse certainly looked the part, projecting unflappable cool from behind Alfie-like eyeglasses in his early book-jacket photos. One can imagine Bailey and Evans slotting him into their book between, say, Michael Caine (who would have been perfect casting as Giles Yeoman) and Jonathan Miller (another multi-hyphenate writer with a taste for dead-on-target satire). Unlike some of his more famous sixties contemporaries, Woodhouse not only survived that tumultuous era, but continued to push past creative and cultural boundaries in succeeding decades. He co-wrote (with Robert Ross) a trilogy of mid-70s alternate history novels centering on Leonardo da Vinci as a kind of Renaissance James Bond. In the 1980s he invented the solar-powered Lightbook, the world’s first e-book reader (for which he’s been dubbed “The Father of Modern Electronic Publishing). Recently, his time has been spent setting up an ambitious, large-scale charitable organization to distribute e-books (and by extension, education) to countless children in impoverished Third World countries. Woodhouse now resides in sylvan contentment in Haslemere, Surrey, England. He recently took time out from his altruistic and creative endeavors to share some of his memories with Cinema Retro.

So, what’s it all about, Martin?

Come Spy With Me

Dean Brierly dons his Nehru jacket and straps on his Walther PPK as he explores the diabolically swinging espionage world of Dick Malloy, Agent 077.

The 1960s gave the world a new kind of cinematic hero, one who redefined conceptions of morality through his indulgence in casual violence and unrepressed carnality. He operated in a fantasy world of spy vs. counterspy, had a license to kill and carried out supercharged adventures in such Technicolor playgrounds as London, Paris, Rome and Istanbul. His adversaries were ingenious, formidable and frequently megalomaniac; his playmates were numerous, voluptuous and frequently duplicitous. He was known by many names. Among the most familiar and enduring were Bond, Solo, Drake, Palmer, Flint.

In addition to these celluloid titans, there was a vast contingent of second-tier spies, overlooked and unheralded by critics, but cheered on by audiences the world over who couldn’t get enough kiss kiss, bang bang. Literally hundreds of cheap but potent European spy films were churned out in the mid-to-late sixties to feed the demand. Like the contemporaneous spaghetti western genre, the Eurospy misses outweighed the hits, but not by as great a margin as is generally assumed. Unfortunately, many of these gems have yet to be rescued from the Siberia of cinema history.

A wave of the Beretta, therefore, to Dorado Films, which recently brought to DVD one of the most notable figures of the Eurospy genre, CIA agent Dick Malloy. Also known as Agent 077, he was played by cult film icon Ken Clark, whose screen persona was at once rugged and graceful, heroic and hedonistic. If Roger Moore and Peter Graves had somehow trumped the laws of nature and produced a love child, it probably would have looked a lot like Clark. Tall and muscular, he radiated manly mojo and looked like he could have kicked Sean Connery’s ass if the occasion ever arose. Even his chest hair looked tough. The athletic actor performed all of his often-dangerous stunts with rare enthusiasm and total commitment. Perhaps more important, Clark was the undisputed master of the action man stance. Nobody, but nobody, posed with such intensely stylish affect. With feet planted shoulder-width apart and torso angled slightly forward, his entire body radiated lethal prowess as he dispensed brutal punches and stylish karate chops. Clark looked equally convincing handling a wide variety of firearms and females, projected an engaging cockiness and, topping it off, looked pretty damn suave in a tuxedo.

MGM will release a boxed set of DVDs containing four major films from acclaimed director John Frankenheimer. The set includes the DVD debut of The Young Savages which marked Frankenheimer's first collaboration with Burt Lancaster. They would go on to make a number of critically-praised films together including The Train, which is also included in the set. The collection will be released January 22nd.

Here is the official MGM press release:

INNOVATIVE CAMERA ANGLES, CAPTIVATING CAR CHASES AND SOCIALLY RELEVANT STATEMENTS CHARACTERIZE ONE OF CINEMA’S FINEST

THE JOHN FRANKENHEIMER COLLECTION

Young Savages, The Manchurian Candidate, The Train and Ronin

Available Together On DVD January 22

LOS ANGELES – From Burt Lancaster and Frank Sinatra to Robert De Niro, director John Frankenheimer has guided the acting powerhouses of Hollywood and his views on important social issues, philosophical topics and the use of unusual camera angles and blocking techniques made him one of the most celebrated filmmakers in cinema history. MGM Home Entertainment brings together four films that illuminate the vision of a cinematic genius when The John Frankenheimer Collection arrives on DVD January 22, 2008, highlighting the director’s renowned career.

Part of the United Artists family, The John Frankenheimer Collection is being released as part of a larger United Artists 90th Anniversary campaign, an 18-month global celebration that honors the films, directors, actors and music that represent the studio’s rich filmmaking heritage leading up to the 90th anniversary of the studio in 2009.

The best of Frankenheimer is showcased in the collection including the 1961 film The Young Savages, a film that first teamed him with Burt Lancaster (Zulu Dawn, The Island of Dr. Moreau) and is the story of a young boy murdered by a New York gang along with the 1965 film, The Train, a World War II action-drama set in the final days of Nazi occupied Paris, which once again teams Frankenheimer with Lancaster and earned an Oscar® nomination for its script.

Also included in the gift set is Frankenheimer’s most iconic film, The Manchurian Candidate, starring the legendary performer Frank Sinatra (Kings Go Forth, Guys and Dolls) in the story of a Korean War veteran brainwashed by the Chinese government in a plot to assassinate the presidential candidate. Rounding out the collection is Ronin, the espionage thriller starring Robert De Niro (Stardust, The Good Shepherd) and featuring Frankenheimer’s trademark elaborate car chases.

The John Frankenheimer Collection will be available for the suggested retail price of $39.98 U.S./$45.98 Canada.

Young Savages

Based on Evan Hunter’s bestseller “A Matter of Conviction,” The Young Savages is set in an East Harlem mired in racial tension and gang violence. While prosecuting the three Italian teens who murdered Robert Escalante (Jose Perez), a blind 15-year-old blind Puerto Rican from a rival gang, Assistant D.A. Hank Bell (Burt Lancaster) learns that there’s more to this case than meets the eye. Also starring Dina Merrill, Edward Andrews, Telly Savalas and Vivian Nathan, The Young Savages is a gritty film replete with “genuine suspense, continual action and brutality" (Los Angeles Examiner).

The Train

Paris, August 1944. With the Allied army closing in, German commander and art fanatic Colonel von Waldheim (Paul Scofield) steals a vast collection of rare French paintings and loads them onto a train bound for Berlin. But when a beloved French patriot is murdered while trying to sabotage von Waldheim's scheme, Labiche (Burt Lancaster), a stalwart member of the Resistance, vows to stop the train at any cost. Calling upon his vast arsenal of skills, Labiche unleashes a torrent of devastation and destruction loosened rails, shattered tracks and head-on collisions in an impassioned, suspense-filled quest for justice, retribution and revenge. Inspired by an actual event and highlighted by spectacular stunt work and visual effects, The Train is "an edge-of-your-seat, thrilling, suspenseful and superior film" (The Motion Picture)

Presented in black and white with feature length audio commentary by director John Frankenheimer and a music only track highlighting Maurice Jarre’s score.

The Manchurian Candidate

Eerie, shocking, daring, thrilling and mesmerizing, The Manchurian Candidate will leave you breathless (People)! Featuring an all-star cast, including Angela Lansbury in an Oscar(r)-nominated performance, this chilling and controversial (Leonard Maltin) film may be the most sophisticated political satire ever made (Pauline Kael). When a platoon of Korean War G.I.s is captured, they somehow end up at a ladies garden club party. Or do they? Major Bennett Marco (Frank Sinatra) can't remember. As he searches for the answer, he discovers threads of a diabolical plot orchestrated by the utterly ruthless
Mrs. Iselin (Lansbury) and involving her war hero son (Laurence Harvey), her senator husband (James Gregory) and a secret cabal of enemy leaders.

Ronin

In a world where loyalties are easily abandoned and allegiances can be bought, a new and deadlier terrorist threat has emerged free agent killers! Featuring "high-octane action" (Gene Shalit, "Today"), a "first-rate cast" (L.A. Daily News) and exhilarating car chases that "are nothing short of sensational" (The New York Times), Ronin is "the real deal in action fireworks" (Rolling Stone) directed by "a master of intelligent thrillers" (Roger Ebert). The Cold War may be over, but a new world order keeps a group of covert mercenaries employed by the highest bidder. These operatives, known as "Ronin," are assembled in France by a mysterious client for a seemingly routine mission: steal a top-secret briefcase. But the simple task soon proves explosive as other underworld organizations vie for the same prize...and to get the job done, the members of Ronin must do something they've never done before trust each other!

Rich in history and devoted to creating powerful, quality films, United Artists (UA) was formed in 1919 by Mary Pickford, Charles Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks and D.W. Griffith to encourage progressive filmmaking, giving each star the authority and autonomy to create the films about which they were most passionate. The studio responsible for creating some of the finest films of all time including iconic film franchises ROCKY, PINK PANTHER and JAMES BOND and critically-acclaimed and award-winning features RAGING BULL, SOME LIKE IT HOT, WEST SIDE STORY, ANNIE HALL, MIDNIGHT COWBOY and RAIN MAN, contains a library of nearly 1,000 feature films and boasts more than 80 Academy Award®-winning classics.

TO ORDER THIS SET FROM CINEMA RETRO'S AMAZON MOVIE AND BOOK STORE CLICK HERE

This fall, spy fans were treated to one of the most interesting metamorphosis’s on the web. In September, Spy Television author Wes Britton transformed his personal webpage into www.spywise.net, making this diverse site a distinctive resource on all aspects of espionage.

 

When www.Spywise.net debuted on September 1^st, Wes brought over many of the exclusive articles, reviews, and interviews from his previous digs including talks with the likes of actors Robert Conrad and Robert Vaughn along with behind-the-scenes looks into notable independent films and books on The Saint, I Spy, and The Man From U.N.C.L.E. Over the years, Wes has interviewed creators of spy-related comic books and documentaries.     

 

Now, one new aspect of Spywise.net is that it is no longer a one-man production. Now, you can find chapters and selected material from a variety of new books like a new interview with Mission: Impossible’s Peter Lupus by Eddie Lucas and the story of a never made  I Spy movie as revealed by expert Mark Cushman. Wes got the rights to publish the first authorized online edition of O. F. Snelling’s classic 1964 James Bond: A Report, including material never published anywhere else. In the pipeline are features by spy babe expert Tom Lisanti and a photo essay on the surprising world of “Zorro the Spy.”

 

Wes is making the rounds to further expand the archives of Spywise.net. For example, on Oct. 22, he dined with Eli (Magnificent Seven) Wallach at the Pennsylvania Jewish Film Festival in Scranton, PA. “I was invited to the festival,” Wes reports, “by Harvey Chertok, producer of the great docu-drama, The Impossible Spy. Wallach had played actual Mossad spymaster Meir Amit in that film, the true story of Israeli spy Eli Cohen.”

 

“Before the screening of The Impossible Spy,” Wes says, “I tried to get Eli to share some anecdotes, and it was difficult as in between every third and fourth sentence, some attendee or another wanted their photo taken with the 91-year-old actor. Including me, I’m not embarrassed to admit.  He talked a bit about his World War II experiences as a medical technician in the Orient and Casablanca. He was with his actress wife, Anne Jackson, whom Eli kept reminding everyone has a cousin who owns the Pittsburgh Steelers. When I told him I was a Dallas Cowboys fan, he replied, `I have played a lot of cowboys.’”

 

Just before we saw the 1987 HBO/BBC film, Wallach was honored with a lifetime achievement award. He told the audience that he had introduced his friend, Clint Eastwood, at many honor ceremonies and that Eastwood had promised to return the favor if Wallach ever got such an honor. “Well, Eastwood didn’t make it to Scranton,” Wes says, “but he did send a nice telegram to the festival.”

 

The morning after the successful festivities, Wallach was stunned to read a report about the evening in the local paper where it was reported he’d converted to Roman Catholicism. “If you read that article,” Wes warns, “remember not to believe everything you see in print. It isn’t true.”

 

Spywise.net is a site to bookmark if you’re an enthusiast of undercover operatives in fact and fiction. You can also keep up with interesting spy items at his blog, thespyreport.livejournal.com

 

Donald Hamilton’s Serious Spy Becomes a Bond Parody
By Matthew R. Bradley

When JFK revealed his fondness for the James Bond books by Ian Fleming, and 007—ably embodied by Sean Connery—struck box-office gold with Dr. No (1962) and its sequels, the resultant “Bondmania” set off a spy craze manifested in everything from atmospheric adaptations of Len Deighton and John le Carré to tongue-in-cheek secret agents on screens small and large. Perhaps the most successful of the latter was Matt Helm, a singing and swinging spy played in four films for Columbia Pictures by Rat Pack member Dean Martin, who unlike Connery shared in the profits from the outset via his own company, Meadway-Claude Productions. The former partner of Bond producer Albert R. “Cubby” Broccoli - Irving Allen - was playing catch-up after deeming Fleming’s work unworthy of filming, which speeded his breakup with Broccoli. But ironically, his quartet of quintessential spy spoofs was actually based on a series of gritty Gold Medal paperback originals by Donald Hamilton that had been launched by Fawcett before Kennedy was even in office, or Connery started shaking his martinis.

Our Man Brierly turns his sights on a couple of key films in the career of director Anthony Mann

Anthony Mann’s filmmaking career lasted nearly three decades, during each of which he mastered a different genre. He came to prominence in the forties with a string of film noirs (1948’s Raw Deal and 1949’s Border Incident but two among many) that rivaled Hitchcock’s for style, suspense and hard-boiled atmosphere. In the fifties, Mann applied his noir sensibility to a series of lean, hard-bitten Westerns starring James Stewart, Winchester ’73 (1950) foremost among them. As the sixties dawned, Mann proved himself one of Hollywood’s most adept directors of big screen blockbusters with the likes of El Cid (1961) and The Fall of the Roman Empire (1964). Linking such disparate films and genres was Mann’s trademark blend of narrative-driven visuals and keen psychological insight.

Although never regarded as an auteur during his lifetime, his films were popular at the box office and generally well received by critics, his last two features being notable exceptions. Both The Heroes of Telemark (1965) and A Dandy in Aspic (1968) have long been considered failures. The former is a war film about Norwegian resistance fighters; the latter one of the bleak spy thrillers common during the sixties. Intriguingly, Mann invests both films with a paranoid tone reminiscent of the nail-biting noirs he cut his teeth on during his first Hollywood decade. A close reading of the films also reveals their stylistic and thematic consistency with his previous, more celebrated work. Now that both are available as Region 2 DVDs, it’s time for a long-overdue reappraisal.

Cinema Retro Editor-in-Chief Lee Pfeiffer and contributing writer Eddy Friedfeld introduced a rare 35mm big screen showing of Our Man Flint at New York's Film Forum Theater on May 3. It was part of the theater's Spies-A-Go-Go festival of classic espionage movies. Pfeiffer and Friedfeld were joined by Bruce Goldstein of the Film Forum for a discussion of the 1965 spy movie classic that was among the most enduring Bond-inspired films that swept the world in the 1960s. A packed house enjoyed seeing the movie in a stunning print provided by Fox's archives. The film looked as good as it did on its initial release. Pfeiffer and Friedfeld, who recorded the audio commentary for Fox's recent Flint double feature DVD set, provided insights into the making of the films and shared many humorous memories of them with audience members. For extensive coverage of the Flint movies, see issue #8 of Cinema Retro for The Unseen Flint that features rare and unpublished production photos from Our Man Flint and In Like Flint.

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