User Reviews

The second entry in the Jerry Cotton, F. B. I. Franchise is thoroughly predictable but nevertheless entertaining. The Bureau is after the Hundred Dollar criminal gang who shakedown store owners for protection racket flees. Of course, they demand a $100 a month or they threaten the proprietor and his business. These guys screw up when they lean on a Italian eatery. In the fracas that ensues when to owner refuses to pay up comes death and then destruction. An urchin outside the restaurant witnesses another man shoot and kill the storekeeper. This mishap prompts an investigation and Jerry is the point man on this affair. As Jerry Cotton, George Nadar is both athletic enough to climb walls and smart enough to fool convicts. He knows how to drive a Jaguar. Director Harald Philipp keeps things popping during this German thriller that transpires in New York City.

I stumbled on this after the first 20 minutes or so had already elapsed on the Film Detective channel when aired on the Dish Network. This was titled Manhattan Night of Murder. The plot reads "An FBI Agent must find a load of deadly explosives edited an American city can be destroyed". The main character is called Jerry Cotton.

Several items immediately caught my eye, including the following: The main character and other supporting cast members are unknown to the US market, however they are apparently well known in other international markets. The main character -Jerry Cotton is an FBI agent who drives an early Series 1 Jaguar E-type fitted with a police radio and nifty- yet very crude tracking screen that allows the driver to track "the bad guys" who's Chevy Impala was tagged by a tracking device that was fired from the rifle aimed by Jerry. Most, if not all of this picture is filmed in and around Manhattan / New York City, and involved pretty cheesy acting, poorly acted fight scenes, incredibly lame "action" scenes of the main actor dangling from a rope after a failed rescue attempt on the side on a building. After the main character is caught by the bad guys, a meeting of senior level men discuss that the "protection racket gang called the Hundred Dollar Boys have kidnapped a young boy". One minute Jerry is tracking the kidnapped boy who is being held in Corvette sting ray through the streets and highways of NYC, all the while there are numerous "quick cuts" showing a "high tech" dispatch / communication center, helicopters, aerial views of an impressive NYC multi - level interstate cloverleaf, then the next minute the car chase is on the backroads of somewhere in rural England (?) and the into a quarry somewhere. The climax ended with Jerry yelling instructions to the small boy who was in the back of a vintage biplane to jump out while the plane was in takeoff mode. Of course Jerry and the boy could clearly converse while he is in the car, chasing the plane and jumps into the car driven by Jerry- just before it crashed into flames.

Significant resources were utilized to dub in ALL of the sounds of car engines, car noises, street scenes, airplane sounds and ALL VOICES. This is in addition to "exciting, action and dramatic" musical overtones reduces this move into a frankly laughable exercise in "what else can be done poorly". Also, overall continuity leaves MUCH to be desired. This is filmed entirely in black and white and it is my understanding that there was one other film in the Jerry Cotton "series". I am unsure if this is the first or last one. Can this film be considered camp? Due to the many unique nuances of this film, it very well may evoke a minor cult following.