I love dollar store DVDs, and this one was a bargain, 2/$1.00, a double feature of "Mr. Go" and "Winterset", so I actually paid 25 cents for this flick. Considering that we don't have cable or satellite, I'll take cheesy old spy films over crap "reality" shows any day.
The cover of the DVD doesn't mention James Mason at all, nor Broderick Crawford (although he has a tiny, ignorable part)...and it's a true hoot to see a very young Jeff Bridges doing many things I'm sure he'd like to forget...if ever I have the chance, I want him to autograph this DVD.
For its time, some of the stuff in here is very overt; there's the Commie lesbian a la the Madchen in Uniform/Lotte Lenya character in From Russia With Love, but in this she actually gets close to down and dirty with the cute female lead. The male/male homosexual scenes were, for the time it was made, quite graphic; I'd be surprised if this ever saw the big screen, uncensored, in the USA, unless it made the drive-in circuit late in the 1990s.
Younger viewers must understand, there were many, many more spy/espionage films made during the 60s and 70s than the classic James Bond and notable Flint movies. I haven't looked it up yet, but I'd put this movie in there with The Balearic Caper, something I saw on channel 9 in So Cal during the 60s. Spy spoof, sorta, but somewhat serious, too. You must keep in mind, we'd been doing duck-and-cover drills in grade school; good, bad, and ridiculous spy films, along with TV shows like The Man From U.N.C.L.E., were the pop culture way of dealing with a persistent and real fear.
Yeah, it's not a great movie, and it might be better watched while high, because trying to make much sense of it is futile or brain-cramping. My husband wants a copy of the soundtrack just because it is so 1970s TV movie chipper and incongruous; a close listen to the lyrics might be quite...trippingly disturbing.
Don't try to watch this as "Art" or "cinema", just appreciate it as a product of its time, no better or worse than it should be, considering what might have happened to it between inception and release. Watch it as a double feature with "Blacula", and keep part of your mind tuned to What We Were Afraid Of during the time these movies were made.
Sheesh...it's just a cheap DVD. But I'm bummed that my copy of Mad Dog Morgan, starring Dennis Hopper as an Australian outlaw, got digital hiccups during the last 1/4 or so, and I doubt that any of the other copies at the buck store wouldn't have the same defect.
The cover of the DVD doesn't mention James Mason at all, nor Broderick Crawford (although he has a tiny, ignorable part)...and it's a true hoot to see a very young Jeff Bridges doing many things I'm sure he'd like to forget...if ever I have the chance, I want him to autograph this DVD.
For its time, some of the stuff in here is very overt; there's the Commie lesbian a la the Madchen in Uniform/Lotte Lenya character in From Russia With Love, but in this she actually gets close to down and dirty with the cute female lead. The male/male homosexual scenes were, for the time it was made, quite graphic; I'd be surprised if this ever saw the big screen, uncensored, in the USA, unless it made the drive-in circuit late in the 1990s.
Younger viewers must understand, there were many, many more spy/espionage films made during the 60s and 70s than the classic James Bond and notable Flint movies. I haven't looked it up yet, but I'd put this movie in there with The Balearic Caper, something I saw on channel 9 in So Cal during the 60s. Spy spoof, sorta, but somewhat serious, too. You must keep in mind, we'd been doing duck-and-cover drills in grade school; good, bad, and ridiculous spy films, along with TV shows like The Man From U.N.C.L.E., were the pop culture way of dealing with a persistent and real fear.
Yeah, it's not a great movie, and it might be better watched while high, because trying to make much sense of it is futile or brain-cramping. My husband wants a copy of the soundtrack just because it is so 1970s TV movie chipper and incongruous; a close listen to the lyrics might be quite...trippingly disturbing.
Don't try to watch this as "Art" or "cinema", just appreciate it as a product of its time, no better or worse than it should be, considering what might have happened to it between inception and release. Watch it as a double feature with "Blacula", and keep part of your mind tuned to What We Were Afraid Of during the time these movies were made.
Sheesh...it's just a cheap DVD. But I'm bummed that my copy of Mad Dog Morgan, starring Dennis Hopper as an Australian outlaw, got digital hiccups during the last 1/4 or so, and I doubt that any of the other copies at the buck store wouldn't have the same defect.