The Double O Section is 11 Years Old

I haven't had too much time to post lately, but I still wanted to follow tradition and mark this blog's 11th anniversary. It's kind of odd that I don't remember beginning this rather time-consuming but thoroughly enjoyable hobby at Halloween time, but I think that was probably the same year I first wore my Prisoner costume, which I've trotted out again and again many times since. So there was probably some spy synergy in the air. Well, there definitely was, since Casino Royale was right around the corner, along with a batch of Special Edition James Bond DVDs we were all quite excited about. For a nostalgic look at what spy things were exciting eleven years ago, take a look at my very first series of posts--a list about exactly that. Of course there are lots more great spy things to be excited about now, and I look forward to blogging about all of them! I expect to be posting a lot more in November than I was able to in October. Happy Halloween, and thanks for reading all these years!

VARGR Contest Winner

It was great yesterday to have not one, but two new James Bond comics out from Dynamite (Warren Ellis's "EIDOLON" and Andy Diggle's "Hammerhead"). The hardest part was deciding which one to read first, but they both turned out to be totally satisfying! Yesterday also concluded the first Double O Section 10th Anniversary Contest, which means that one lucky reader won a copy of the beautiful hardcover edition of Ellis's first 007 story arc for Dynamite, "VARGR." And that winner is...

Andrew A., of Boulder, CO. Congratulations, Andrew!

Thank you to everyone who entered. Stay tuned for another cool Bond contest coming up in a few days. And for those who didn't win this one, James Bond 007: VARGR is available from Amazon and I highly recommend it!

Read my review of James Bond 007: VARGR #1 here.
Read my interview with writer Warren Ellis here.

Double O Section 10th Anniversary: Top 7 Spy Scores of the Past Decade

The score is an integral element of any movie, but for me even moreso in a good spy movie. As a genre, spy movies have a more distinctive sound than just about any other popular genre—yet there are endless variations on what we think of as that "spy sound," as evidenced by this fairly eclectic list of....

My Favorite Spy Scores 2006-2016

1. Daniel Pemberton: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (2015)

Urged by director Guy Ritchie to avoid the brassy, bombastic spy tropes of James Bond music for his 1960s-set film version (review here) of the classic TV show, Daniel Pemberton drew instead from slightly more obscure corners of Sixties spy music and ended up creating the most enjoyable soundtrack of the decade. He comes out of the gate offering not horns, but bongos and flutes, setting the precedent for an eclectic score that evokes more than anything the somewhat obscure Eurospy scores of the decade (and their close cousins, Spaghetti Westerns) by the likes of Ennio Morricone and Piero Umiliani. His inspired use of a cimbalom also recalls not only Morricone’s Arabesque, but some of John Barry’s great non-007 spy music, like The Ipcress File and The Persuaders!, as well as Edwin Astley’s harpsichord-heavy ITC music. What it doesn’t especially recall is Jerry Goldsmith’s original U.N.C.L.E. music, and his theme from the show is basically absent. Would I have liked to have heard a new version of that theme in the movie? Sure, of course I would have. But I find it impossible to complain when what we’ve got is the most creative spy score of modern times! Pemberton’s music is the perfect accompaniment to Ritchie’s movie, which is a finely-crafted love letter to the same sorts of Sixties cinema from which the composer draws.
                                                                                                                                           
2. David Arnold: Casino Royale (2006)

David Arnold had done wonderful things with The James Bond Theme in his Pierce Brosnan-era Bond scores, but by deciding to withhold that famous theme (other than a few well-deployed bars) until the end of Casino Royale (review here), he demonstrated exactly how capable a composer he is for this franchise. The recurring "You Know My Name" melody throughout not only recalls the way John Barry used to incorporate the theme song into each score, but also serves as a fine theme for the character on its own. This is a Bond score that doesn't need the Bond theme, and that's a very impressive feat! In fact, I'm a little bit disappointed that "You Know My Name" didn't become a secondary recurring theme for Craig's Bond the way "007" was in the Barry days. Casino Royale is a spectacular Bond score, and would also be a spectacular score and theme establishing an entirely new character or franchise.

3. Michael Giacchino: Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2011)

Michael Giacchino really upped his game in his second Mission: Impossible score. He made ample use of the Lalo Schifrin themes fans want to hear  (“Mission: Impossible Theme” and “The Plot”), but also created a lot of riveting original music that felt like a logical expansion of those themes rather than something so contemporary it felt at odds with the classic material. Best of all were the localized variations on the main theme. I absolutely love the track, “Mood India,” a terrific piece of local flavor music that slowly morphs into a Bollywood take on the famous theme. Likewise, the Middle Eastern-flavored “A Man, A Plan, A Code, Dubai” subtly incorporates Schifrin material into the sort of epic local flavor music that characterized the best Bond scores of the Sixties and Seventies. And he even gives us a take on “The Plot” with a Russian chorus that sounds out of The Hunt For Red October for the Kremlin sequence!

4. Henry Jackman and Matthew Margeson: Kingsman: The Secret Service (2015)

For Kingsman (review here), Henry Jackman and Matthew Margeson went the opposite route from Daniel Pemberton on The Man From U.N.C.L.E. While he sought to intentionally avoid brassy Bondian bombast, they revel in it. While distinctly contemporary, this is an unrepentant pastiche of classic Bond scores, and quite a successful one at that. (If only the movie had been as good!) The epic sound does a lot to make the film’s budget-conscious setpieces feel bigger than they are, and tries its best to make digital mattes like the Kingsman underground hangar feel as spectacular as we wish they looked. The album is a great listen outside of the film itself that simply screams, “spy!”

5. Herbert Gronemeyer: A Most Wanted Man (2014)

Herbert Gronemeyer’s very contemporary score for this taut John le Carré thriller is another one that manages to say “spy” without the traditional musical vocabulary of the genre. It does so through its wonderfully downbeat tone (utterly appropriate for the le Carré material), which always makes me feel like it’s raining when I hear it out of the context of the movie, and with its impeccable sense of place. The score not only convey’s “Hamburg” very effectively; it specifically conveys the Muslim community within Hamburg when called upon to do so. Some of the more ambient tracks, like “Text from Jamal,” are downright Eno-esque. Gronemeyer's score is completely modern, but it's the perfect 21st century compliment to Sol Kaplan's The Spy Who Came in from the Cold soundtrack.

6. Ludovic Bource: OSS 117: Cairo Nest of Spies (2006)

While I was initially disappointed (as with The Man From U.N.C.L.E.) that this comedic Eurospy revival (review here) didn't make use of Michael Magne's infectious original OSS 117 theme, my disappointment was quickly mitigated by what an awesome job Ludovic Bource did capturing the spirit of the era in which the film is set. His score perfectly matches the mise-en-scene, special effects, fight choreography and all the other behind-the-scenes elements that meticulously recreate early 1960s filmmaking. The movie is a comedy, but the score plays things completely straight, as scores must in a successful parody. (Spy, Johnny English and Austin Powers all also delivered straight, good faith spy scores.) Even the scene in which star Jean Dujardin ends up flinging chickens at an opponent is scored earnestly—or at least in the manner of the era. With its hip, lounge-y vibe (my favorite cue is the ultra-chill "Froggy Afternoon"), North African local flavor and occasional legit action number, Bource most directly evokes Henry Mancini's Sixties Pink Panther music. It accompanies the film perfectly, and makes for a great listen on its own.

7. John Powell: Fair Game (2010)/Green Zone (2010)

Reflecting my own tastes, the majority of my choices on this list are deliberate throwbacks. But this pair of 2010 scores by Bourne composer John Powell ring with a thoroughly contemporary spy sound. Powell is the first composer to completely redefine what audiences think of as “spy music” since John Barry defined the sound to begin with in the Sixties. Both composers worked within a wide spectrum of sub-genres, from outlandish fantasy (You Only Live Twice in Barry’s case; Knight and Day for Powell) to grounded, serious action (From Russia With Love; the Bourne films) to gritty drama full of bureaucratic hurdles (The Ipcress File; Fair Game), applying their signature motifs across the board. While many great composers have worked in the spy genre over the last several decades (and some have experimented with totally different sorts of scores), no one has so exhaustively overhauled the sound of spy movies as Powell. Barry’s jazz-infused style remained the expected and accepted soundtrack of the genre up until the 2000s (when it may have been partially done in by George S. Clinton’s spot-on pastiche in the Austin Powers movies). Now it’s propulsive percussion–which offers somewhat less room for variation, but perfectly compliments the high-energy spy movies being made today–and Powell brings that in spades to Fair Game (review here) and Green Zone (review here), signaling “spy” to the audience as loudly as Barry-like trumpet flourishes did in the past.

VARGR contest code word: AMBER

Double O Section 10th Anniversary: Top 10 Spy Novels of the Past Decade

While I haven't seen all the spy movies to be released around the world over the past ten years, I have certainly seen the majority of them. The same can't be said for spy novels. There are simply too many published every year to possibly keep up with all of them. But I do read a whole lot of spy fiction, and try to stay on top of the new stuff. Here are ten of my favorite spy novels published during the past ten years.

My Favorite Spy Novels 2006-2016

1. The Nearest Exit by Olen Steinhauer (2010)

If you haven't read this book, it's a bit unfair of me to list it as the best spy novel of the decade, because it can't really be read as a one-off; it actually requires you to read three books. The good news is... all three are fantastic! The Nearest Exit is the middle novel in Steinhauer's Milo Weaver trilogy, which begins with The Tourist (2009) and ends (for now, anyway) with An American Spy (2012). It's tough to pick a favorite of those (especially between the last two), but when it came out The Nearest Exit blew me away with the best "knot," to use Connie Sachs' term, since Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. The characters are compelling; the tradecraft is impressive, and the espionage plot is ingenious. Publishers absolutely love to label any new spy novel with a variation on "le Carré meets Ludlum" (odd as those particular bedfellows are), but Steinhauer really delivers on that, combining exciting action of the latter with the rich characterizations, complex plots and moral uncertainty of the former. It astounds me that these books have not yet been filmed. Perhaps if Steinhauer's new TV show Berlin Station proves successful, that will be remedied.

2. A Most Wanted Man by John le le Carré (2008)

Speaking of le Carré, the all-time master of this genre is still as sharp as ever in his eighties. Not only has he remained prolific (I don't begrudge his contemporary Len Deighton enjoying his retirement, but oh how I wish he were still publishing as well!), but he's remained topical. Le Carré may have written about the Cold War better than just about anyone else, but that period was hardly the limit of his outrage. If anything, he's gotten angrier as he's gotten older. Some of his later books might suffer a bit from getting overly polemical, but A Most Wanted Man is the perfect concoction of literary fury. It's not only the best novel of the "War on Terror," but easily among the best in the author's justly celebrated oeuvre, featuring some of the most memorable characters he ever created. How many authors are still producing some of their best work in their eighth or even ninth decades? Le Carré is a towering talent still at the top of his game. His follow-up novel, Our Kind of Traitor, was also fantastic, as was his memoir this year, The Pigeon Tunnel. I can't wait to see what he does next.

3. Red Sparrow by Jason Matthews (2013)

Proving once again that spies and authors draw from similar skill sets, former CIA officer Jason Matthews penned as impressive a debut novel as you're ever likely to read in this compelling tale of the spy games very much still being played between America and Russia. The novel follows Russian SVR agent Dominiki Egorova and up and coming CIA officer Nate Nash first separately, and then as their paths ultimately converge. While most of us will never be able to judge a spy novel for its accuracy, Matthews certainly lends an air of authority in his descriptions of tradecraft and Agency politics that feel incredibly realistic. Red Sparrow was the first in a trilogy, and unfortunately the second novel, Palace of Treason, was a serious letdown, but I'm holding out hope that Matthews will bounce back with his third novel and cement himself a spot among the great spies-turned-writers like le Carré, Greene and Fleming.

4. The Devil in Amber by Mark Gatiss (2006)

Before Mark Gatiss shot to Internet superstardom as co-creator of the BBC's terrific Sherlock, he penned a trilogy of fantastically fun spy/adventure novels featuring the unlikely secret agent "by appointment to His Majesty" Lucifer Box. Box is a sort of debonair, bisexual mash-up of Sherock Holmes, James Bond and Oscar Wilde, and as witty a narrator as you could ask for. In my review here when this second book in the Box trilogy came out, I wrote that it gave me "just about the most pure enjoyment I’ve gotten out of any book in a long time." All these years later, it still stands out for that. Granted, I must admit that that might have something to do with my specific tastes, which seem to be nearly identical to Gattiss's. Into this supernatural John Buchan/Dennis Wheatley pastiche,/parody, he mixes healthy doses of James Bond, Hammer horror, Adam Adamant, Doctor Who and P.G. Wodehouse. For me, that adds up to sheer joy. Anyone who enjoys Gatiss's work on Sherlock and Doctor Who should definitely seek out The Devil in Amber (as well as its precursor, The Vesuvius Club). Read my full review here.

5. The Last Run by Greg Rucka (2011)

For his work on the sublime spy series Queen & Country (comprised of both comics and novels), Greg Rucka made that very first list that started this blog ten years ago, so it's not surprising that he's making this one too. What is a bit surprising (and disappointing), is that he hasn't written more spy novels since then! But the one new Queen & Country novel to come out in the past decade was more than worth the five year wait that led up to it. This is by far my favorite of the subgenre of contemporary espionage that Lee Child memorably and humorously dubbed, "something about Iran." Rucka uses Iran to tell a very contemporary twist on the classic Cold War spy novel. His field heroine, Tara Chace, finds herself on the run deep in enemy territory (quite a Quiller predicament), while his desk hero, Paul Crocker, is faced with that age-old dilemma of trying to figure out whether a potential defector is too good to be true. You don't have to have read any other entries in this superb, Sandbaggers-inspired spy series to enjoy The Last Run, but if you have, it rewards on multiple levels. I really, really hope that Rucka returns to the Queen & Country universe again, be it in a new novel or a new comic series. In fact, that's one of my dearest spy fan-related hopes. Read my full review of The Last Run here.

6. A Foreign Country by Charles Cumming (2012)

Along with Olen Steinhauer, Charles Cumming is probably my favorite contemporary spy writer. He reliably delivers a great read every time, but A Foreign Country, the first of his novels featuring British agent Thomas Kell, is my favorite of his to date. Though the stakes (involving the first female head of MI6) are incredibly high, the story itself is relatively small for contemporary spy ficiton, and I found that appealing. It's also a great example of one of my favorite type of spy plots, the secret war between friendly nations. In this case, that secret war turns deadly. Like Jason Matthews, Cumming is a master at describing tradecraft with a palpable sense of realism, and a lengthy shadowing operation with a very limited surveillance team is the highlight of this novel. This was optioned by Colin Firth's company back in 2013 as a potential starring vehicle for the actor (who I think would be great as Kell). Earlier this year it was reported that the project is still alive, but might take the form of a miniseries rather than a movie. That's something I would love to see!

7. The Moneypenny Diaries: Secret Servant by Kate Westbrook (2006)

When The Moneypenny Diaries concept was first announced, it sounded like a terrible idea. It seemed like a blatant attempt by Ian Fleming Publications to capitalize on the then zeitgeisty success of Bridget Jones' Diary... which seemed like an odd zeitgeist to capitalize on for the heirs of Ian Fleming. So who would have predicted such an odd experiment would produce the best James Bond continuation novel of the last decade? Unfortunately, it was so under the radar that hardly anyone outside of hardcore Bond fans ever found out about it. But the second book, in particular, in Samantha Weinberg's really quite brilliant trilogy definitely deserves a larger audience. Weinberg, writing as Kate Westbrook, actually wrote a Bond novel with the potential to appeal to the sorts of spy fans who don't normally give 007 the time of day. She penned a Bond novel, with Miss Moneypenny as the protagonist, set in John le Carré's world—mixed with actual history. In Secret Servant, we see Bond's Service torn apart by a mole and M acting like Control in Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. Add to that real-life traitor Kim Philby and his wife Eleanor, and you've got the makings of a Bond novel unlike any other and a treat for Bond fans and fans of the "desk" half of the spy genre alike. Read my full review of The Moneypenny Diaries: Secret Servant here, and my interview with Weinberg here.

8. Double or Die by Charlie Higson (2007)

The Moneypenny Diaries wasn't the only seemingly bad idea by Ian Fleming Publications to strike unlikely gold in the past decade. The announcement that they would explore the adventures of James Bond as a boy in a series of Young Adult books seemed like an equally blatant Harry Potter (and Alex Rider)-inspired cash-grab, and initially provoked consternation among many fans. But author Charlie Higson improbably made this unlikely premise work, and ended up penning some of the very best James Bond continuation novels to date, as well as some of the best of the very rich trend of Young Adult literature in the early 2000s. It's a toss-up for me whether Blood Fever (which pre-dated this blog) or Double or Die is my favorite, but there is no question that the latter is a fantastic read. In attempting to decrypt a secret code, James and his Eton friends find themselves on a scavanger hunt across pre-WWII London involving gambling, Soviet spies and a nascent Bletchley Park. It's a great Young Adult adventure that feels authentically Bondian, and a fantastic read. Read my full review of Double or Die here.

9. Restless by William Boyd (2006)

William Boyd eventually became a James Bond continuation novelist himself, and penned a decent 007 entry with Solo. But it wasn't nearly as good as his original spy novel Restless, a literary thriller about a young woman in 1970s Britain searching for the elusive truth about her mother's past as an agent of William Stephenson's British Security Coordination during WWII. The BSC makes a fascinating backdrop for a spy novel, dealing again with that theme of spying between friendly nations. In this case, that spying includes the real-life historical efforts of Stephenson's organization to draw America into the war to aid Britain. But both the 1940s and 1970s storylines are compelling (unlike in the miniseries, which gave short shrift to the Seventies one), and Boyd creates two terrific heroines. It should be noted that there's an excellent audio version read by Bond Girl and Oscar nominee Rosamund Pike. Boyd's masterpiece is Any Human Heart (a novel that features a little bit of spying—and Ian Fleming as a character—but which isn't really a spy novel), but Restless is also well worth reading.

10. Dead Line by Stella Rimington (2008)

Stella Rimington is another former spook turned successful author, and like Jason Matthews, she lends credence to the theory that the two professions rely on some of the same skill sets. Like Matthews, the former Director General of MI5 brings an air of undeniable authenticity to her Liz Carlyle spy novels. Dead Line is among Rimington's best, and expands the tapestry a bit from her previous books. Rather than focusing on Carlyle and her antagonist, she follows many different agents working for different countries and different branches of the British intelligence community this time around. While it isn't immediately clear how all of these storylines are related, the converge in a most satisfying manner, culminating in an assassination attempt at a peace conference in Scotland. Rimington also proved prescient (again, not surprising given her former profession) in predicting the significance of Aleppo in world affairs. Read my full review of Dead Line here.

Those were ten of my favorite spy novels of the past decade, though I could easily make a list of fifty! (Well, maybe not easily. These things take time to write!) What were some of yours? I'd love to get some recommendations for my reading pile.

Addendum: I cannot believe that I forgot to include Jeremy Duns' excellent debut novel, Free Agent! It was easily among my favorites of that period, but for some reason I had thought it came out sooner.

The contest code word is: AMBER.

Double O Section 10th Anniversary: Top 7 Spy Movie Set Pieces of the Last Decade

Spy movies, perhaps more than any other genre, are known for their setpieces. I would say we have Alfred Hitchcock to thank for that mainly, but the Bond movies certainly solidified the expectation of at least one great setpiece in any spy movie. A good setpiece can transcend a bad movie (Moonraker isn't many people's favorite Bond film, but who would dare claim that the midair fight over a parachute isn't spectacular?), or even ruin a good one (I realize I'm in the minority here, but I was more or less on board with Kingsman up until that ugly and misanthropic—but undeniably well-shot—church scene insinuated itself into my mind as the movie's truly indelible legacy). A classic setpiece (even one borrowed from another film) can define not only a movie but a franchise, as happened when Brian De Palma riffed on Topkapi for the famous dangling sequence in the first Mission: Impossible feature. So while some of these setpieces come from spy films I selected as the best of the last decade, I still feel that they deserve a list of their own. So on that note, and continuing the celebration of the Double O Section's ten years on the Internet, here are...

My Favorite Spy Movie Setpieces 2006-2016

1. Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation Opera Sequence (2015)

Brian De Palma may have built a career on (quite ably) creating his own distinctly Hitchcockian setpieces, but Christopher McQuarrie did him one better in the fifth Mission: Impossible movie with a sequence in which Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) must prevent an assassination from the wings of a performance of "Turandot" at the Vienna State Opera. Guided by the same gimmick that gave structure to one of Hitch's most memorable setpieces in his second version of The Man Who Knew Too Much, the action builds logically to the piece of music being performed on stage ("Nessun Dorma"), its inevitable violent conclusion punctuated by a circled note in a musician's score. Into this McQuarrie organically weaves good looking actors in tuxedos and gowns, a gun disguised as a bass flute, a fight literally informed by stage business, and even moments of unforced comic relief. It's the most beautifully staged sequence in any spy film during the last decade.

2. Casino Royale Parkour Chase (2006)

There was little typical about Martin Campbell's James Bond reboot Casino Royale, and the signature action sequence that would normally come before the credits instead unfolds just after them, the pre-credits moments having been used, quite effectively, to show the new Bond (Daniel Craig) earning his Double O status. The Madagascar-set foot chase boldly lays out a new direction of the venerable franchise, declaring quite forcefully that 007 can not only compete in an arena becoming crowded by challengers like the kinetic Jason Bourne or the extreme xXx; he can still dominate. It also firmly established what we could expect of Craig. As much as I loved Pierce Brosnan's performance as James Bond, it's impossible to imagine him in his fifties convincingly keeping pace with freerunner Sébastien Foucan, the real-life athlete who plays the bomb maker Bond is chasing. This is a fantastic example of when the Bond producers see something spectacular (like a car executing a barrel roll or a skier parachuting off of a cliff) and make it their own, and demonstrated that Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli could do that just as well as Cubby. Although parkour had been utilized in Luc Besson's niche District B13 French action movies, it was not then as ubiquitous as it has since become thanks to Casino Royale. After Austin Powers and Jason Bourne, 007 was at risk of becoming passe. But when Daniel Craig crashed through a wall to even the distance with his quarry, it became immediately clear that the venerable character wasn't going anywhere.

3. The Bourne Ultimatum Tangier Rooftop Chase (2007)

Paul Greengrass may have established his seemingly chaotically immersive put-the-viewer-in-the-middle-of-the-action style in The Bourne Supremacy, but he finessed it greatly in The Bourne Ultimatum. Nowhere is that better demonstrated than in the film's breathtakingly exciting rooftop chase through Tangier. The North African city, with its romantic blend of African and European architecture, has long been an iconic spy location, and this chase scene achieves the ideal symbiosis between elaborate action and exotic setting. Greengrass and cinematographer Oliver Wood take full advantage of the city's distinctive rooftops, bristling with antennas, as Bourne (Matt Damon) pursues an assassin named (perhaps prophetically) Desh on motorcycle and on foot. It's impressive watching Ludlum's amnesiac agent ride the motorcycle up as well as down the city's narrow staircases, but the really exhilarating moment audiences all remember comes when, in one especially spectacular shot, the hand-held camera leaps after Bourne from one upper storey window into another in the middle of the foot chase! If I had to pinpoint one moment during this decade that spy (and action) filmmaking changed, that would be it. Greengrass took action photography to a new level, and we've seen that move (which featured prominently in the movie's trailers and TV spots) copied again and again ever since, in everything from Quantum of Solace to Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Just as the Wachowskis' famous "bullet-time" shot from The Matrix had defined the previous decade of action cinema, this one did the next.

4. SPECTRE Pre-Credits Sequence (2015)

If you ever doubted that competition was good for the marketplace, just witness the sometimes hostile oneupmanship that's gone on between the Bond and Bourne franchises since 2002. Here is another sequence that offers its own variation on Greengrass's iconic window-to-window leap, but raises the stakes. While Greengrass's camera stayed on his hero for that single breathtaking moment, Sam Mendes and cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema kept their camera on Daniel Craig's James Bond for a full four minutes, culminating in action sequence much larger in scale than jumping through a window. This is an example of a setpiece that's greater than the movie that contains it. The entire pre-title sequence, from its striking production design to its stunning Mexico City location to that Touch of Evil-style tracking shot, is the most memorable part of SPECTRE. I've watched the opening far more times than I've watched the whole movie since buying the Blu-ray.

5. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy: Guillam's File Theft (2011)

Of course, a great spy movie setpiece doesn't have to involve action. Van Hoytema also shot an equally striking, equally thrilling sequence for Tomas Alfredson's 1970s-set Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. Like McQuarrie, Alfredson channels Hitchcock in making a trip to a library as exciting as Tom Cruise dangling from something. It may sound like heresy to some fans, but one scene in which the BBC's Tinker, Tailor miniseries always let me down was in its translation of the most suspenseful scene from John le Carré's novel in which Smiley's right-hand man, Peter Guillam (Benedict Cumberbatch) is tasked with removing a file from the ultra-secure registry of the Circus. Smiley is an outsider, and requires the file for his investigation into which of the cabal currently in charge of British Intelligence is a Soviet mole. Alfredson actually improves upon the sacred text of the miniseries in this sequence. His careful camera movement and deliberate, beautifully composed shots all make visual the paranoia that Guillam is feeling as he betrays his bosses for the greater good. It's another perfect marriage of cinematography, production design, direction and acting, and to me it's the film's iconic scene.

6. Jason Bourne Greek Protest Chase (2016)

And here we are once again returning to Paul Greengrass and Jason Bourne. The fourth Bourne movie with Matt Damon is regrettably not nearly as good a film as Ultimatum, but it still boasts an incredible setpiece—easily the best I've seen this year. Once again Bourne is on a motorcycle, this time weaving through increasingly angry crowds of protesters at an anti-austerity rally in Greece. It's the perfect backdrop for a spy chase in our present time, turning the social unrest currently boiling over all around the world into an obstacle and cover for our hero. Furthermore, while his imitators seem to get worse and worse, Greengrass just keeps getting better at doing what he does. As in Green Zone, you feel like you're right in the middle of this dangerous protest as shots ring out making it even more dangerous. This time Bourne is the prey rather than the pursuer, and the sense of danger is palpable. It might not be the best entry in the series, but Jason Bourne is well worth seeing for this incredible sequence alone!

7. Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol Burj Khalifa Sequence (2011)

Yes, I keep returning to the same several franchises. But there's a reason that they're the top box office draws in the spy genre, and the reason is their amazing setpieces. Tom Cruise seems driven to top himself in each Mission: Impossible entry by performing a wilder stunt that takes him further off the ground than he was in the previous film. Since dangling was clearly established as his character's thing in the original Mission: Impossible movie, dangling from the world's tallest building was probably too tempting an opportunity to resist. With Tom Cruise there's an extra layer at play in an action setpiece, because we all know that he's pretty much nuts and loves to put himself in physical danger. In Bond movies we generally take it for granted that it's a stuntman performing the more improbable feats, and that's never detracted from them one bit for me. But there's an extra frisson in knowing that you're watching the movie's actual star in peril. The circumstances that demand that Cruises's Ethan Hunt go mountaineering about outside the famed Dubai skyscraper are quite ingeniously concocted, and director Brad Bird achieves spectacle by going the opposite direction as Greengrass. Instead of putting the camera close up, right behind the star's head, he opens it up wide, showing us the entire vista and making the deadly geography immediately clear. And home viewings will never match the added spectacle of seeing this film in an IMAX theater, where the image itself opened up from scope to fill the entire large format screen from top to bottom. The dizzying vista was literally breathtaking.

So what were your favorite setpieces of the last decade? Please feel free to weigh in in the comments below! And check back all week for more lists and some great contests!

The Double O Section Turns Ten: A Look Back at the Best Spy Movies of the Last Decade

It’s hard to believe I’ve been doing this for a decade. There are very few things that I’ve stuck with regularly for that long! But it was ten years ago today that I published my first post on this blog, a list of seven names that were both then relevant to spy entertainment, and also indicative of the sorts of topics I planned to blog about. It’s weird that I can’t even remember now that it was Halloween time when I published my first post. I don’t remember what costume I wore or where I went that year to celebrate, or with who. But I do remember that the first Daniel Craig James Bond movie, Casino Royale, loomed large at the time. It played a huge part in why I decided to start blogging about my love of all things spy. It was the most exciting time to be a Bond fan since that first GoldenEye trailer showed up in theaters a week earlier than expected over a decade prior. And it still is! But this blog hasn't just chronicled the Daniel Craig era of James Bond. It's covered an interesting period in spy entertainment. So I thought I'd celebrate the tenth anniversary with some more lists, like that first post. The obvious list to start with is movies. Usually decade lists are made, well, for a given decade. 2006-2016 is admittedly an odd span to cover with such a list. But it's actually been a pretty remarkable period for our favorite genre, encompassing a lot of great movies all very different from each other.

Before I get to that list, however, I want to thank two people who were instrumental in the inception and longevity of this blog: Nora, who first put the idea in my head of starting a blog, and Josh, who's created a number of terrific graphics for me over the years, including these anniversary banners. Stay tuned for more interesting lists spanning the last ten years over the coming week, as well as news, reviews, and a contest or two!

Click on the titles for links to my full reviews, where applicable.

My Favorite Spy Movies 2006-2016

1. Casino Royale (2006)

That movie we were all looking forward to when I wrote that first post not only revitalized the 007 franchise, but proved to be one of its very best entries of all time. While I hadn't come to that conclusion at the time I posted my initial pre-release thoughts, or even by the time I wrote my full review after seeing it again, over the years it's risen to second place on my own list, following only On Her Majesty's Secret Service.

2. OSS 117: Cairo Nest of Spies (2007)

Michel Hazanavicius crafted a near-perfect send-up of Sixties spy movies (despite his film actually taking place in the late Fifties) while simultaneously reviving a classic Eurospy character in his two OSS 117 films starring the incomparable Jean Dujardin. He beautifully, lovingly recreated not only the hallmarks and cliches of the genre and the era, but also the filmmaking techniques. I remain ever hopeful he'll still make a third!

3. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011)

John le Carré may be the undisputed master of the spy novel, but in 2011 his name hadn't been seen on screen for a decade. Director Tomas Alfredson kicked off the le Carré screen revival that led to this year's mega-successful miniseries The Night Manager with his stunning, gorgeous adaptation of the greatest spy novel ever written. I still marvel at the brilliance of Bridget O'Connor and Peter Straughan's remarkable script, a masterclass in adaptation that managed to perfectly preserve the spirit of the lengthy novel by brilliantly changing just about every scene. It's an incredibly economical script demanding the audience's full attention throughout. No bit of exposition is repeated. This is another movie desperately crying out for a sequel; I'm dying to see Alfredson tackle another Smiley novel.

4. The Lives of Others (2006)

Director Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck's masterful Cold War-era, East German-set film ably demonstrates the breadth of the spy genre. It's as far from James Bond as you can get, but a film that actually examines the act of spying itself, and what it can do to its practitioners when they start to identify with the people they're spying on.

5. Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2011)

It's hard to believe that Tom Cruise has now been playing Ethan Hunt for longer than any actor ever consecutively played James Bond. But the Mission: Impossible series was not healthy at the time Brad Bird was hired to direct its fourth installment. Cruise had been briefly banished from the Paramount lot, and the studio had even contemplated giving the series to its direct-to-DVD arm. Bird, unproven in live action, shot new life into the series by turning to the TV show for inspiration. In doing so, he not only made the first entry in that series that I unabashedly love, but also made one of my favorite spy movies of the decade. The setpiece in which Cruise dangles from the Burj Khalifa may be the most memorable, but nothing in the film excited this fan of the show as much as the line at the end when the voice of the IMF name-checks "The Syndicate!" Happily, Christopher McQuarrie continued with the tone set by Bird, making the Mission: Impossible series one I now look forward to nearly as much as James Bond.

6. Green Zone (2010)

There's no question that director Paul Greengrass changed action cinema when he imbued The Bourne Supremacy with his signature style of shaky camera movements and fast edits. He spawned a number of imitators, but hardly any of them have been able to successfully recreate his style, and the result has been a number of jolty action sequences so chopped up you can barely tell what's going on. But even Greengrass had not perfected that style with his first spy movie. The Bourne Supremacy was partially successful, but The Bourne Ultimatum was better. Green Zone, however, is the culmination of Greengrass's collaboration with Matt Damon. This movie demonstrates exactly what that style is meant to do: it puts the viewer right in the middle of the action, and it's utterly thrilling.

7. The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (2015)

Modern movie reboots of classic Sixties spy series seldom prove creatively successful. The Avengers, The Wild Wild West, Get Smart, and countless others have come up severely short despite, in some cases, promising creative teams. But Guy Ritchie managed to make a thoroughly entertaining spy movie by valuing the spirit of the series above the letter. Some fans were disappointed that he didn't serve up a beat-for-beat recreation of the show. He did something better. He set the film in its original Cold War period, but with the benefit of hindsight was able to fully explore the dynamic of an American agent and a Soviet agent working together in ways the TV series simply couldn't at the time. And he did it with great style and a spectacular soundtrack. Like the OSS 117 movies, this was a thrilling love letter to Sixties spy movies.

8. Bethlehem (2013)

Here's a movie that deserves a much wider audience. Yuval Adler made one of the best realistic spy movies of the decade in his story of a young intelligence asset torn between his Israeli handlers and his Palestinian brethren. It delves deeply into the true nature of spying and the high cost paid by those caught up in it. This is the second-best le Carré movie of the last ten years, a feat all the more remarkable given that le Carré had nothing to do with it!

9. Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)

If there's one genre that's characterized these last ten years more than any other at the box office, it's superhero movies. Hollywood studios finally discovered the riches to be mined by faithfully adapting classic comic book characters and story arcs instead of dumbing them down or camping them up. Some viewers complain of over-saturation, but if you ask me Marvel Studios has managed to avoid that by setting its films in distinctly different genres. And the second Captain America movie is undeniably a spy movie. It takes its cue from classic paranoid Seventies spy thrillers like 3 Days of the Condor and Marathon Man, and takes much of its storyline from the Iran-Contra-era comic book Nick Fury vs. S.H.I.E.L.D. (Though Fury himself is only a supporting player to Cap, this is very much a S.H.I.E.L.D. movie!) But what makes it a great spy movie isn't what it borrows from the past, but the direction it set for the future. This was the first major Snowden-era spy movie. It spoke to the paranoia Americans were beginning to feel about their espionage apparatus, as the dust settled on the post-9/11 era in which spies were once again portrayed as heroic. Sibling directors Anthony and Joe Russo took advantage of the fact that they were telling a story about a fictional spy agency, rather than MI6 or the CIA, and told a story that really cant' be told with real-life organizations. And their treatment of the evil organization Hydra and its infiltration of S.H.I.E.L.D. paved the ground for new versions of The Syndicate in Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation and SPECTRE in the most recent Bond movie.

10. Skyfall (2012)

Casino Royale was no one-off. Daniel Craig has managed to make two classic Bond films so far during his tenure. Skyfall may divide fans, but director Sam Mendes managed to take 007 to new box office heights by combining the darker character exploration that made Casino Royale great with the fun, more over the top action that characterized the best moments in Roger Moore's tenure. It was great to see Q and Moneypenny return to the series, and to see some humor injected back into Bond while simultaneously delivering a mature story. It's not a perfect film. It's got flaws. But it's still fantastic!

Check back tomorrow and all week for more 10th Anniversary celebrations, including those contests!

Sixth Blogiversary

Amidst the excitement of a new James Bond movie and the milestone of this blog's millionth hit last week, I'm a day late in celebrating another milestone: the Double O Section's Sixth Blogiversary. I started this blog six years ago as we were looking forward to a brand new Bond movie with a brand new Bond that proved to be one of the series' best entries. Now we're on the verge of another new Bond movie (in America, anyway; for British readers it's already here!), one that I suspect will prove the biggest ever at the box office, and the excitement is palpable. In the six years I've been blogging about spy movies, the genre has only become more and more popular. We've seen terrific new movies about some of spydom's greatest heroes, including Bond (of course), George Smiley, Jason Bourne and Ethan Hunt. We've seen the rise of exciting new spy heroes like Bryan Mills, and seen historical spy missions thrillingly chronicled on film, like the so-called "Canadian Caper" in Argo. We're really living in the the second Golden Age of Spy Movies, with the genre at its greatest height since the Sixties, and it's been a great pleasure to chronicle it. With Skyfall about to take the world by storm, I don't see the genre declining any time soon, and I look forward to continuing to blog about it for years to come! But all that's just  me blathering. A better way to celebrate this blogiversary is with a new contest. It's been way too long since we've had one of those! Check back tomorrow for a chance to win a great spy prize.

The Double O Section Celebrates its Millionth Hit

Today is a milestone in the six-year history of this blog, as the Double O Section racked up its 1,000,000th hit! (And it's 1,000,007th hit.) Thanks, as always, to everyone who reads it regularly or visits from time to time for contributing to that achievement. I'm sorry things have been a bit slow around here for the past few months, but that's going to change very soon as I return to regular reviews and even some new contests! So stick around for the next million. Be seeing you!

Fifth Blogiversary!

The Double O Section is Five Years Old

This week marks the fifth anniversary of this blog. That seems like a very long time. It seems like I've been writing it forever, but it also seems impossible to imagine not writing it. It's been a huge part of my life for the last five years, and I expect it will be for a long time to come. I want to thank all my devoted readers for letting me share this part of my life with them as well. In my very first post back in 2006 (really a series of posts), I listed (00)seven figures foremost on my mind at the time in the world of fictional spies. Most of them were of some sort of timely relevance, but also just authors, actors and characters I was really into at the time. I'm still into all of them (regular readers can no doubt attest that my Elke Sommer obsession has not diminished), but who's at the forefront of my spy thoughts right now? At the moment I'm more into spy books than spy movies, and I'm more into the more serious side of the genre, favoring the world of Le Carré to that of Fleming. That pendulum will swing back at some point, of course (one of the truly great things about the spy genre is how wide it is, with so many completely different secret corners to explore), but right now I'm really enjoying the dark, double-cross-filled territory. That means revisiting a lot of classics, and in many cases becoming more familiar with them. I've been delving much deeper into Le Carré's back catalog in the past year, eagerly devouring books I never read during my first brush with his work, and revisiting favorites. (The imminent new movie version of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy no doubt played a pivotal role in stoking those fires, but it's the books themselves that keep them burning.) I've also gone back to Len Deighton. I'd previously read books about his unnamed spy (known on the screen as Harry Palmer), but now I'm plunging into the incredibly rich world of Bernard Samson for the first time in print, and loving those books even more than Deighton's earlier stuff. I'm also discovering (largely thanks to the many other wonderful spy sites out there, links to which you can find on the right) new and old authors who toil in this dirty side of the genre for the first time, which is always exciting. (Existential Ennui's interview with Anthony Price, for example, opened my eyes to his works, which I've been enjoying, and Jon Stock made a good impression on me with his debut spy novel, Dead Spy Running—though that one leans a bit more Bond than the rest of these authors I'm discussing.) I'll be writing more about all of these authors in the coming months here on the Double O Section.

But just because I'm in a serious spy state of mind doesn't mean I don't have time for the more fantastic side of the genre—or even the sillier side. This fall we may not have the new Bond movie that we're all (I assume) clamoring for, but we have three perfect embodiments of three totally different corners of the spy genre. For serious skulduggery, we've got Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. On the opposite end of the spectrum, for sheer silliness there's Johnny English Reborn. (I'll have a full review up later in the week, but suffice it to say that I thoroughly enjoyed myself, and I can't understand the curmudgeonly majority opinion of mainstream critics.) And somewhere else entirely, there's Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol representing the 007 school of thrilling, over-the-top spy action. Mission: Impossible is a franchise that's never far from my mind, whatever corner of the spy genre I'm skulking in at the moment. I've never cared much about the movies (though I have my fingers crossed for this new one, in the talented hands of Incredibles director Brad Bird!), but I love that TV show with all of my heart. And while that love started with the show's weaker Eighties incarnation (which we're finally getting on DVD in a few weeks!), it was really cemented by watching the original series DVDs—all of which have come out in the five years I've been writing this blog. While I was obviously passionate about spies long before I started blogging, that passion has only increased during this past half-decade. Writing the blog helps me discover new things in a genre I love, and I enjoy sharing those things I discover just as much. I'll be doing a lot more of that in this coming week to further celebrate this milestone, and I'll also be waxing nostalgic a bit more and running a few contests with great spy prizes as a thank you to the readers who tune in regularly to read my musings. So be sure to check back. Thanks a lot!

500,000th Hit

I missed the exact moment, but the Double O Section quietly reached its 500,000th hit milestone over the weekend. Thanks, everyone, for making that happen!

Tradecraft: MGM Plots Year-Long James Bond Anniversary Celebration For 2012

Variety offers a few additional intriguing details on today's earlier story about the long-delayed next James Bond movie (Number 23 in the official chronology) finally starting production.  Notably, the trade reports that "MGM, which received a cash infusion last month of $500 million, had been expected to move quickly to lock down Craig and Mendes for the project in order to take advantage of the 50th anniversary of the Bond franchise.  MGM has already been working up plans for a 2012 yearlong commemoration of the golden anniversary of the first Bond pic, 1962's Doctor No." I like the sound of that!  Presumably at the very least that "yearlong commemoration" will see the remaining titles finally released on Blu-ray, but what else does it hold? Theatrical re-releases?  New books?  (You can bet on that!)  More toys?  (Action figures, please!)  What else?  I can't wait to see! Hopefully they'll pull out all the stops. Variety also backs Sony as the most likely distributor for Bond 23: "Insiders believe MGM may turn to Sony for co-financing, as it did on Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace, or sell off some major foreign territories." 

For all the details on today's announcement, see "James Bond is Back in Action!"

Taken: Extended Cut Contest Winner

Vegas Comes Up 007!

The winner of yesterday's flash contest for the Taken: Extended Cut DVD is Glen O. of Nevada.  Congratulations, Glen!  Your DVD will be mailed out this week. Weird, that's the second flash contest in a row won by someone from Nevada.  Guess it is a lucky state!  Despite all the contests this past week in celebration of the Double O Section's fourth blogiversary, I didn't manage to pack in quite all the prizes I'd intended to.  Consequently, I guess I'll just have to run some more in the weeks ahead!  Stay tuned.

In the meantime, this week's two biggest contests are still running.  There's still time to enter the huge DK giveaway for a chance to win DK James Bond books and the first two volumes of James Bond Blu-rays (click here for all the details on how to enter that contest) and to enter the contest to win OSS 117: Lost in Rio on DVD (click here for the details on that one). The DK James Bond contest runs until Monday night, and the OSS 117 contest runs until Thursday night.

Read my review of Taken here.

FLASH CONTEST: Win Taken: Extended Cut On DVD

Here's another flash contest as we wrap up this week of celebrating the Double O Section's fourth blogiversary. Up for grabs is one copy of Fox's single-disc Extended Cut DVD of the 2009 Liam Neeson neo-Eurospy movie Taken (review here).  And I'm changing up the rules again.  Since it's a weekend and there are likely fewer people surfing the net, I'm going to let this one run a bit longer. The winner will be announced at noon tomorrow, Pacific Time.  (That's after the time change happens if you're wondering.)  The prize will go to the seventh person to email me using the subject line "Taken Contest" and including your full name and mailing address in your email.  Entries that don't follow those guidelines will be discarded. Don't automatically assume someone else has already won until I post a winner.  Maybe everyone else is assuming that, too. The order of responses will be based on the time stamps in my Yahoo! email account.  The contest starts NOW, so go for it! Good luck!

And don't forget, there's still time to enter the huge DK giveaway for a chance to win DK James Bond books and the first two volumes of James Bond Blu-rays (click here for all the details on how to enter that contest) and to enter the contest to win OSS 117: Lost in Rio on DVD (click here for the details on that one). The DK James Bond contest runs until Monday night, and the OSS 117 contest runs until Thursday night. There will also be other long- and short-term contests popping up in the days ahead, so be sure to check back frequently!

Read my review of Taken here.

*The Fine Print: One entry per person, please. Double entries will be disqualified. One winner will be chosen based on the order of responses. The winner's name will be posted here and he or she will be notified via email. All entries will be deleted immediately after the contest’s close, and no personal information will be retained or transmitted to any third parties. This contest is open to anyone, in any country, but foreign readers should note that this is a Region 1 NTSC DVD and make sure that they have the proper equipment for playback. Unfortunately, the Double O Section cannot assume responsibility for items lost or damaged in transit.

CONTEST: Win OSS 117: Lost In Rio On DVD!

Time for the next of the many contests that will keep popping up this week to celebrate the Double O Section's fourth blogiversary–and it's another good one, if I do say so myself!  (Well, I don't run bad ones...) Earlier this week I reviewed Music Box's recent DVD of OSS 117: Lost in Rio, and today I have four copies of that awesome, awesome parody of Sixties spy movies to give away!  I said this movie belonged in every spy collection (which it definitely does), and here's your chance to add it to yours for free.  Unlike Wednesday's "instant win" flash contest (of which there will be at least one more, so keep checking back throughout the weekend!), we'll run this one fairly traditionally.  All you have to do to enter to win one of four copies of OSS 117: Lost in Rio is send an email with the subject heading "OSS 117 Contest" including your name and mailing address to the Double O Section by 11:59 PM, Pacific Time on Thursday, November 11 (James Bond's birthday!), 2010.* The winner will be announced in one week's time, next Friday, November 12. Good luck! And be sure to check back often for more great contests popping up randomly throughout the weekend and maybe even into next week.

Speaking of contests, the DK Books/James Bond Blu-ray contest is still running as well, so be sure to get your entries in by Monday for a chance to win those amazing prizes, too.  Full details on how to do that can be found here.

Read my review of the OSS 117: Lost in Rio DVD here.
Read my original film review of OSS 117: Lost in Rio here.

*The Fine Print: One entry per person, please. Double entries will be disqualified. Four prize-winners will be drawn at random and announced on Friday, November 12, 2010. The winners' names will be posted here and they will be notified via email. All entries will be deleted immediately after the contest’s close, and no personal information will be retained or transmitted to any third parties. The contest is open to anyone, in any country, but foreign readers should note that these are Region 1 NTSC DVDs and be sure they have the proper equipment for playback. Unfortunately, the Double O Section cannot assume responsibility for items lost or damaged in transit.

Repost: Fury In Marrakesh Review

Continuing this week's blogiversary celebration, here's another "classic" repost.  The ending of this Eurospy movie is just so bizarre that it's forever etched on my memory.  But even before that, the movie is just a lot of fun, and a great example of the genre. Here's the first part of my review of Fury in Marrakesh, along with a link at the end to the entire original post:

DVD Review: Fury In Marrakesh (Furia A Marrakech) (1966)

For a movie with Marrakesh in the title, I was expecting a lot of deserts and North African rooftops and marketplaces. But while the film does offer those sights, it also offers so many more: tropical beaches, Times Square neon, and snowy Alpine vistas. Fury In Marrakesh takes us to hot spy locations all around the world, and lets us soak up the atmosphere. It’s actually one of the best spy movies I can think of in terms of sheer variety in exciting settings. It’s also one of the most fun Eurospy films I’ve seen, delivering almost everything you could want from the genre: impressive chases, good fights, cool gadgets (loads of ‘em, in fact!), beautiful women (though, surprisingly, not a main one) and, of course, the aforementioned locales. Top that all off with one of the strangest, jaw-droppingly mind boggling endings of any Eurospy flick, and it’s easy to recommend Fury In Marrakesh–highly. In fact, provided they’re not put off by the inexplicable oddness of the ending, this would be a great introduction to the genre for James Bond fans looking to broaden their spy horizons. Maybe the next step into Eurospy waters from the slightly more sure footing of Deadlier Than the Male.

Supposedly Fury In Marrakesh is the third in the "Bob Fleming" series that began with Secret Agent Fireball, but it’s so hard to actually delineate Eurospy series since the movies and their characters had so many different names in the various countries they were released in. (Based on the popularity of the three genuine "077" movies starring Ken Clark, that number was ascribed to just about every Eurospy hero in one country or another at various times!) The marketing campaigns for Fury In Marrakesh showcased in the poster gallery on Fin de Siecle’s new Region 2 DVD call the movie by many different names (Death Pays In Dollars is a good one) and identify the hero as, variously, Bob Fleming, Joe Fleming and Bob Dixon, among others. On the English language dub included on this disc, Bob Dixon is the name they go with. But the movie is from the pen of Ernesto Gastaldi, writer of the two previous Bob Fleming movies, and directed by the team responsible for the first one as well, so it’s reasonable to assume that it is meant to be a Bob Fleming adventure. If it is, though, then it’s a Casino Royale-like reboot of the brief series–and only a year after it began! Fleming is now played by the younger, lither Stephen Forsyth, stepping into Richard Harrison’s shoes. And when we meet him, he’s still in spy school. Fury In Marrakesh is the story of his first mission. (His boss even worries it’s "too complex a mission " to send so green an agent!) And Forsyth (coming off as sort of a cross between George Lazenby and John Phillip Law) is better suited to playing a neophyte agent than the more world-weary Harrison. So is this a carefully constructed and deliberately recast prequel revealing all the complex motivations that drive Fleming in his subsequent adventures, explaining how he became such an arrogant chauvinist? Actually, it kind of works along those lines–but, no, clearly not. No Eurospy adventure was ever that thought through. It seems clear that it’s supposed to be a different character entirely, so I’ll call him by the name he’s given in this print: Bob Dixon.

For what it ultimately becomes, Fury In Marrakesh opens quite inauspiciously, with a girl drugging a man and then robbing his safe... which is hidden inside an awfully fake-looking television set. (What happens if someone wants to watch TV?) After this action-free, single-setting pre-title sequence that clearly has nothing on James Bond, we’re into the credits and the zippy theme music. Then the SPECTRE-like villainous organization assembles, and their perpetually sunglasses-wearing leader addresses them, dramatically revealing, "My real name is Karl Kuntz!" with a louder, obviously different voice than the rest of the dub. What could be the reason for that? Judging from the non-removable Swedish subtitles, the Swedes think he's called Charlie Clark. His objective? To spread Nazi counterfeit dollars and pounds ("Hitler's treasure," found in a hidden vault), flooding the market, making him and his men rich and ruining the American economy! (And presumably the British one as well, though he doesn’t mention it.) But there’s a problem. Someone in his own organization has already stolen some of the counterfeit money. The girl from the opening! She’s called Monique on the English track and Dora on the Italian one and in the Swedish subtitles, and she’s played by Dominique Boschero (Secret Agent Fireball, Fantastic Argoman).

The action moves to New York City, represented in 1965 by the World’s Fair... a place apparently teeming with spies! An American official says that Monique " was spotted by one of our agents at the Fair." One of them! Apparently, it was seen as a wise allocation of government funds to deploy lots of agents to the World’s Fair! I guess it was cheaper than really sending them to all those countries... and, hey, it paid off! Hearing that intel, the suited American officials determine, "We’re going to need the most discrete agent the CIA can assign to this mission." Cue Bob Dixon....

Go here to read the my entire review including a sleazy Q, a cocky agent, a crazy spy school and lots of striptease numbers.