Upcoming Spy DVDs: Lassiter (1984)!

One of my favorite 80s movies and one of my favorites of the cat burglar-forced-to-spy subgenre, Lassiter is coming to DVD! On April 24. I figured the only way we'd ever see a Lassiter DVD at this point was on MOD, but this is an actual DVD from an obscure company that specializes in obscure movies that are particularly awesome: Hen's Tooth Video. No matter what else they did, I would be forever indebted to Hen's Tooth for their Region 1 release of my favorite Eurospy movie, Deadlier Than the Male. (If you don't own that and you're reading this blog, stop whatever you're doing, follow this link, and go buy it right now. Done? Okay, now we can continue.) The week before that, they're also releasing another great Tom Selleck period adventure from the same era (while he was trying to make up for missing out on Indiana Jones by grasping at anything like it), High Road to China. That one's not a spy movie, but it does have an excellent John Barry score. High Road to China will be available on both DVD and Blu-ray.

In Lassiter, Selleck plays the suave titular cat burglar, operating in 1930s London. When British and American Intelligence get wind of a major diamond shipment moving through the German embassy, the spooks force Lassiter to pull another job—for them, It Takes A Thief-style. As he plots the heist, he finds himself between two beautiful women: his sweet, long-suffering girlfriend, played by former Bond Girl Jane Seymour, and sexy femme fatale Lauren Hutton. Persuaders! composer Ken Thorne provides the jazz-heavy, period-appropriate soundtrack. One of my favorite moments to date toiling (fruitlessly, thus far) in the Hollywood salt mines of screenwriting came on a heist movie my partners and I were writing that had endured an excruciatingly lengthy development process, when one of the producers name-checked Lassiter on a conference call. I was so excited to discover that there was someone else in this industry for whom Lassiter was a touchstone (and reassured that despite the frustrations of the project, I was clearly working with the right person), and I hope that this DVD release makes it a touchstone to a whole new generation as well. It's a really fun movie, and for my money Selleck's best theatrical effort.