‘Hey, King Kong, what’s on in the way of muscles tonight?’
A journalist meets a Central American politician for the first time at a backstreet casino. When they leave, the statesman is shot dead by someone from a passing car. The reporter trails the dead man’s chauffeur to a train bound for Berlin and gets sucked into the murky world of international espionage…
More 1960s Eurospy games for American beefcake Ken Clark, who checks in as this week’s ‘Bond on a Budget.’ Sergio Grieco directs this Italian-French co-production under his usual pseudonym of Terence Hathaway, and Clark gets to juggle gorgeous gals Irina Demick and Loredana Nusciak.
Investigative newsman Dick Hallam (Clark) splits his time between delivering copy for the Herald Tribune and playing the tables at a dodgy gambling house. When he intervenes to prevent a little hometown cheating, he leaves with a chunk of change along with new friend, Francisco Aguirrez (Michel Bardinet), democratic candidate for the Presidency of El Salvador. Out on the street, they are ambushed by three thugs courtesy of the casino management, and during the fight, someone shoots Bardinet from a passing car. After a chat with the police, Clark takes the train to Berlin in pursuit of Bardinet’s shifty driver, Max Schulz (Angelo Infanti), who’s leaving town with sexy redhead Sylvie Meynard (Demick). While the couple are in the dining car, Clark raids their compartment and swipes a watch before he’s interrupted by Demick. Moments later, the train crashes and Clark is dragged out of the wreckage unconscious.
Possession of the watch means that Clark is mistaken for Infanti, who died in the accident. So he’s spirited off by agents of the mysterious Shadow, led by the deadly Nadia (Nusciak). They want something that Infanti was bringing to them, but he hasn’t a clue what that might be. Demick is also snatched, and together, the two manage to overcome their captors and escape. Falling into the hands of the local CIA, led by Brook (Luigi Vannucchi), Clark is offered the chance to expose the Shadow and other groups playing the game. After being kidnapped by Nusciak again, this time during a night club act where she masquerades as a magician, Clark comes face to face with the mysterious Shadow (Grégoire Aslan). The villain confirms that the workings of the watch conceal the vital clue that will lead to the item that everyone is searching for.
Clark was one of the most familiar faces in the Eurospy genre in the mid-1960s, and his powerful physique, easy charm and ruggedly handsome good looks made him a good fit for the role. He starred in a loose trilogy of films as Agent 077 Dick Malloy: ‘Mission Bloody Mary/Agente 077 missione Bloody Mary (1965), ‘From the Orient with Fury/Agente 077 dall’oriente con furore’ (1965) and ‘Special Mission Lady Chaplin/Missione speciale Lady Chaplin’ (1966). He may be cast here as a journalist rather than a spy, but it’s a minor variation on the familiar formula of fistfights, gunplay and bedroom action. There’s a little more self-deprecating humour to the character than he usually displayed, and he handles it well. His likeable presence is the project’s primary asset, but the production gives him little assistance. There’s an almost complete absence of gadgets or outlandish elements and no notable stunt work or action set pieces. His adventures as Dick Malloy were much more fun.
Instead, it’s a 90-minute chase after a McGuffin carried out by a bunch of pretty anonymous characters who revolve around Clark. Grieco injects the action with a good pace, but it’s all make-weight stuff, with very few moments that register in any meaningful way. Identity is an ongoing theme as no one is who they pretend to be, which is potentially interesting, but the audience could be forgiven for losing track of who all these henchmen in suits are and who is pulling their strings. The cast delivers professional performances, but Sandro Continenza and Roberto Gianviti’s script fails to create any memorable characters and only a handful of interesting moments. A bad guy does get decapitated by the pendulum of a big clock, though, and that’s something you don’t see every day.
There is also a somewhat baffling scene where Clark and Demick go to a bakery in Berlin to buy some Baumkuchen. This is a popular German cake, so called because it’s made by adding layers of dough or batter onto a cylindrical, rotating spit. An exchange with the shop assistant sends them to a popular night spot with the same name (who names their club after a cake?), rendering the whole sequence strangely pointless. Baumkuchen is not a brand attached to a specific manufacturer, so it doesn’t seem like the kind of crass product placement pioneered by the Bond franchise and the scene is so short it doesn’t even qualify as padding. Maybe it was some kind of an in-joke? We’ll probably never know.
On the credit side, Grieco and cinematographer Stelvio Massi were veteran filmmakers, and they do deliver some interesting visuals and creative shots from time to time. There is also a stylish opening credit sequence using torn diary pages, shots of street life in Paris and a bold, brassy score by Riz Ortolani. The climactic scenes play out in a TV studio, allowing Grieco to show some decisive combat play out via monitor screens. It’s a nice touch, if a little overdone. The English dub track also provides some genuine moments of amusement. The voice acting is wooden and disinterested, and there are some clangers in the dialogue, such as ‘The secretaries I have don’t know shorthand; they just know how to take their clothes off.’
Demick was born Irina Dziemiach in 1936 in a commune in Seine-et-Marne in Northern France. As a young woman, she moved to Paris to become a model and had a small role in Claude Boissol’s comedy film ‘Julie the Redhead/Julie la rousse’ (1959). More importantly, she began a relationship with famous American producer Darryl F Zanuck, and he added her to the case of World War 2 epic ‘The Longest Day’ (1962). Further roles followed in French cinema, and she also had a featured supporting role in the high-quality drama ‘The Visit’ (1964), starring Ingrid Bergman and Anthony Quinn. She also took seven different roles in Ken Annakin’s star-studded comedy ‘Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines; Or, How I Flew from London to Paris in 25 Hours and 11 Minutes’ (1965). However, by the early 1970s, her career was already winding down, and she was appearing in low-budget productions such as Alfonso Brescia’s dreary Giallo ‘Naked Girl Murdered in the Park/Ragazza tutta nuda assassinata nel parco’ (1972). She retired from the screen the same year and passed away in 2004.
Ken Clark’s other 60s Erurospy escapades are worth checking out. This one? Not so much.