CinemaSerf
12/26/2022
At times this is in danger of tripping over it's own cloak and stabbing itself, but Richard Johnson ("Wilde") still just about manages to keep it interesting for ninety minutes. He is a British secret agent who is charged with bumping off a Czech scientist who has defected to join the CIA in the UK. Needless to say, this is not going to be a straightforward quest - and it only becomes more complicated when he discovers that there is an whole network of people in whom he is uncertain he can trust. Those duplicitous individuals include his own boss "Canning" (Harry Andrews) and a host of recognisable British faces - Gordon Jackson, Maurice Denham and Diana Dors as well as his CIA oppo "Lucinda" (Sam Wanamaker). In the best tradition of John Buchan's "39 Steps", the search leads him to a remote Channel Island location where peril lurks and bodies start piling up. It's a bit on the long side this, it would have made for a better and more enthralling hour or so, and director Seth Holt could have cut out much of the rather yawning character establishment and a fair chunk of the rather wordy dialogue. Still, once we get into the home straight, it offers a fair degree of intrigue and is an adequate cold war thriller that passes the time, but is unlikely a film you will ever want to watch again.
