The Assassination Bureau

Rating:
Summary: When spies were way cool!!!
Review: Back in the pop culture-friendly 60's, the spy game flourished on the big screen. During that decade, one could take his/her pick of the adventures of James Bond, Derrick Flint, or Matt Helm. Even on the television, there was "The Man from U.N.C.L.E.", "The Girl from U.N.C.L.E.", "Honey West" (a private eye), "Amos Burke" (Gene Barry's former police chief turned secret agent), two classics starring Patrick McGoohan ("Secret Agent" and "The Prisoner"), "The Wild, Wild West", and the comic parody, "Get Smart".

This was also the time of the big-budgeted "chase" flick. Movies like "It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad, World", "The Great Race", and "Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines".

Well, "The Assassination Bureau" has a little bit of them all: tongue-in-cheek humor; a casting coup with "The Avengers" Diana Rigg and Oliver Reed, fresh from "Women in Love"; a pre-"Kojak" Telly Savalas (who had also been featured in the James Bond film "On Her Majesty's Secret Service", along with Rigg); a rollicking score; and nifty special effects, especially the concluding battle on the airship.

In the words of that great statesman Austin Powers, "It's groovy, baby!"

Rating:
Summary: James Bond, as written by Jules Verne
Review: In Science Fiction Fandom this type of tale is called "steampunk", a term derived from "cyberpunk" and not entirely appropreate. Cyberpunk tends to be depressing, while steampunk is usually a romp. "The Wild Wild West" television show was steampunk (so was the movie, but who wants to remember THAT thing?). So were "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea", and "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen". Where does "The Assassination Bureau" fit on this list? Well toward the top, of not at the very peak. The story is VERY loosely based on a peculiar short story of the same name by Jack London (lots of period Radical Politics, very little charm, and no Diana Rigg). Taking that as its starting point the film romps through double dealing in Edwardian London, rascality and raids in a period Parisian bordello, skullduggary and poisoning in Venice, the assassination of Benny Hill (in a bit part as a minor Balkan Prince), and ends with a duel and a bang.

Previously available only (so far as I know) on an EP videotape. A widescrean DVD almost HAS to represent an improvement. Is it greedy of me to hope that some commentary (by Rigg, perhaps) will be included? Probably.

In any case; one hell of a romp.

Rating:
Summary: "Surrender is no defeat--for a woman."
Review: The film "The Assassination Bureau" is based on the novel by Jack London. It's a spoof of the action-adventure yarn, laced with gentle comedy--a period piece set in the early 1900s. The heroine, Miss Winter (Diana Rigg) is a prim-and-proper newspaper reporter who develops a theory that all of the seemingly random world-wide killings committed by anarchists are actually crimes conducted under contract by a group of hired assassins operating as The Assassination Bureau.

Miss Winter's theory interests Lord Bostwick (Telly Savalas), the owner of a large London newspaper, and he agrees to publish Miss Winter's story when she announces her intention of destroying the bureau by contracting the death of the bureau's organizer, Ivan Dragomiloff (Oliver Reed). After infiltrating the Assassination Bureau, Miss Winter offers the contract to Dragomiloff, and he, curiously enough, accepts. By accepting the contract, he hopes to test the efficiency of his operatives, and so, a game of cat and mouse ensues as Dragomiloff travels throughout Europe trying to assassinate his operatives before they [do away with] him.

This fast moving film takes Dragomiloff and Miss Winters to France, Italy, Germany, and Switzerland as they assassinate their way across Europe. Operatives include Phillipe Noiret as Monsieur Lucoville--puritanical crusader at home, and bordello owner by night, and Curt Jurgens stars as the splendid but crazed swordsman General von Pinck. Warren Mitchell (Alf Garnett of Till Death Do Us Part fame) plays Herr Weiss--the rather nervous Swiss assassin.

The sets are marvellous, and the romantic sparks between Diana Rigg and Oliver Reed ignite the screen. They are a wonderful contrast to one another--Rigg is the suffragette who hopes that her career as a newspaperwoman will strike a great blow for women everywhere. Reed as Dragomiloff cuts a powerful, potent figure, and even Miss Winter can't resist his charms. Their on-screen chemistry is quite powerful. This film is a smooth, pleasant, entertaining diversion and is reminiscent of films such as "The Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines," and "The Great Race"--displacedhuman