Remembering Roger Moore

The great Sir Roger Moore has passed away after a short battle with cancer, according to numerous news outlets. And this is the piece I have most dreaded writing ever since I began this blog. Roger Moore may not have been the screen’s "best" James Bond in terms of realizing Ian Fleming’s literary character, but he is certainly one of the most appealing. He is the one you most want to hang out with. He was my favorite Bond as a kid, and was always the Bond actor I most fancied having a conversation with. Even now, when I’m in the mood for a Bond movie in general but have no specific title in mind, I find myself most frequently putting on a Moore movie—usually For Your Eyes Only (1981), easily in my Top 5 Bond movies.

Roger Moore personified the witty playboy adventurer who brushes off danger without creasing his immaculately tailored suits. He perfected this persona most famously across three different characters—TV’s Simon Templar on The Saint and Lord Brett Sinclair on The Persuaders!, and of course 007—each distinct, and yet each distinctly Roger Moore. He sold a personal brand long before we spoke in such terms, and he sold it to perfection. Critics have accused him of turning all of his roles into Roger Moore rather than adapting Roger Moore to the roles, but for a movie star, I’ve never seen that as a bad thing. In fact, I’ve always found it incredibly appropriate that at the height of his Saint fandom in the 1960s, while every popular TV character (including The Saint) had his own Annual (hardcover books for children packed with stories, comics, and puzzles), Moore was the only actor to have his own—The Roger Moore Adventure Book.

It was a narrative often put forth by Moore himself that he was not a good actor. Always charmingly self-deprecating, he once famously reduced his own acting ability to, “left eyebrow raised, right eyebrow raised.” He was, of course, selling himself short, and I’m saddened to see that many obituaries today still persist with that narrative. Many James Bond purists lament that Moore played the character so comically, and they certainly have a point. But ask any actor what’s harder, comedy or drama, and nearly unanimously they all answer comedy. It’s true that Roger Moore was not one of the screen’s great dramatic actors (though he was certainly capable of fine dramatic performances, as evidenced in The Man Who Haunted Himself and several crucial scenes in For Your Eyes Only, among others), but he was an incredibly gifted comedian, and deserves recognition as such. His comic timing was impeccable, and his wry delivery of innumerable oft-quoted one-liners unequaled. For proof, one need look no further than other, subsequent James Bond actors who have been saddled with similar lines and unable to pull them off despite their undeniable dramatic gravitas. Roger Moore had a unique talent to sell even the most ridiculous double-entendres or pithy asides, and that talent more than anything else carried the Bond franchise to new Box Office heights in the Seventies and ensured its continuation after Sean Connery.

This is another part of Moore’s legacy that should never be overlooked. While all the other popular spy series of the Sixties (on the big and small screen) dried up in the Seventies (as public perception of spies themselves shifted from heroic to underhanded in the wake of Watergate, COINTELPRO, the Church Committee Hearings, and other scandals), James Bond thrived during Moore’s tenure. Moonraker may not have pleased critics, but it broke Box Office records. What Roger Moore brought to the franchise was exactly what audiences craved in the 1970s. Without him, the series may well have languished, but instead it became more popular than ever.

Despite eventually personifying the upper-class English gentleman, Roger Moore was born into a working class London family. He grew up idolizing suave leading men like George Sanders and Stewart Granger, and following his compulsory army service and a stint as a male knitwear model (which briefly earned him the nickname of “The Big Knit”), had the chance not only to follow in their footsteps, but eventually to work with both. After a string of supporting roles as an MGM contract player opposite the likes of Elizabeth Taylor and Lana Turner (during which, Moore wrote in his autobiography*, he and his neighbor William Shatner “whiled away many an evening… sitting around the pool [of their Westwood apartment complex], having a drink or three”), Moore found success on television. First as the titular knight on Ivanhoe (for England’s ITV, where he would later find stardom as The Saint), then as a cowboy with an unlikely accent on The Alaskans and Maverick (both for Warner Bros.), where he had the unenviable task of filling the void left by James Garner, playing Brett (Garner) and Bart’s (Jack Kelly) English cousin Beau Maverick. In the former he found himself speaking Garner’s lines (a writers’ strike led to scripts from Maverick being recycled wholesale for The Alaskans), and in the latter wearing his clothes (from his autobiography: “They assured me that I wasn’t replacing [Garner]. Oh yeah? Then why did all of my costumes have ‘Jim Garner’ in them, semi-scratched out?”). It would prove valuable experience for later, when he once again found himself taking over from a very popular actor!

Moore’s real fame, however, came not from American television, but UK television. After trying himself, unsuccessfully, to acquire the rights to Leslie Charteris’ Saint stories several years earlier, Moore jumped at the chance to play Simon Templar for producers Monty Berman and Robert S. Baker at Lord Lew Grade’s powerhouse production company, ITC. He made 118 episodes of The Saint, the first batch in black and white, and the second (without Berman) in color. Charteris had imbued his hero with ample wit to match his wits, and Moore, naturally, excelled at conveying that wit on screen. His Simon Templar would break the fourth wall to directly address the audience, making the most of Moore’s innate charm. Simon Templar was the absolute perfect part for Moore, the idea match of character and star. In America, The Saint played on NBC, making Moore a household name on both sides of the Atlantic. It was also his first major brush with spy stardom, as, though Templar was no agent, his adventures frequently brought him into espionage territory.

Once The Saint wrapped, Moore was eager to segue from television into movies. He and Baker, now producing partners, made Crossplot, a highly entertaining Hitchcock knock-off (parts North by Northwest and The Man Who Knew Too Much) in which Moore played an advertising executive caught up in an espionage plot who has to stop an assassination. Bernard Lee, best known as M from the Bond movies, co-starred, and the advertising campaign traded heavily on Bondian imagery, prominently featuring Moore in a white dinner jacket brandishing a pistol. It wasn’t the first connection between Moore and 007. His name was linked with the Bond role as soon as the first movie was announced, but of course Sean Connery was cast instead. Still, Moore played the character in a 1964 sketch on the BBC comedy series Mainly Millicent, and in the Saint episode “Luella” (co-starring future Felix Leiter David Hedison), Templar jokingly introduced himself as James Bond. In another episode, he ordered his drink “neither shaken nor stirred.”

Moore and Baker had planned several other films together (including, according to Andrew Pixley, the spy drama The Patterson Report and an action-adventure called Vanishing Point**), but never had the chance to make them. Instead, Moore was lured back to television by Lew Grade, who had already sold The Persuaders! based on Moore’s involvement, but without his permission! He then persuaded Moore to make the series by urging him to think of all the jobs it would create, and the boon it would be to the British economy. (“Think of the Queen!”) And thank God it worked, because The Persuaders! is fantastic. It’s one of my favorite TV series, and it's actually his character from that show, Lord Brett Sinclair, that I think of first when I think of Roger Moore... much as I love his Saint and his Bond.

The Persuaders! arose from an idea Moore and Baker had had while shooting the final season of The Saint—the idea of a buddy series teaming Moore with a brash American co-star. The Saint episode “The Ex-King of Diamonds” served as an unofficial pilot, pairing Moore with The Champions star Stuart Damon. When it came to the series, however, a bigger name was required, and when Rock Hudson proved unavailable, Tony Curtis came aboard as self-made oil millionaire Danny Wilde. When Brett and Danny first encounter each other on the French Riviera, the two wealthy alpha males find themselves instantly in competition, first in a road race (Brett’s Aston Martin DBS versus Danny’s Ferrari Dino), and then in a fist fight over the proper way to make a ridiculous drink called a Creole Scream. In the course of this fight, they tear apart the whole hotel bar and find themselves facing a judge, Judge Fulton (played by Diamonds Are Forever’s Laurence Naismith), who offers them an alternative to a jail sentence. It turns out he manipulated their meeting, having selected them to be his personal vigilante crime fighters. It’s a tenuous premise, but it serves its purpose, setting Brett and Danny on numerous missions against kidnappers, counterfeiters, and, of course, spies. (Somehow this judge is also privy to information about classified British Intelligence operations when the plots require that.) The Persuaders! had a top-notch roster of talent (including Avengers writer Brian Clemens and Casino Royale director Val Guest) both behind and in front of the cameras, and their skills combined with lush location filming in exotic European locales (as opposed to The Saint’s stock footage and studio backlots) made every episode of the series look like a feature film. But more than anything, it was the fantastic chemistry between Moore and Curtis (whose off-screen relationship influenced their friendly on-screen competition) that made the series work so well. While The Persuaders! faced stiff competition in America from Mission: Impossible, it was a huge hit around the world, and a second season was in the offing… until Moore received a life-changing phone call from Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman.

During his Bond tenure, Moore made numerous other action-adventure movies, including Gold (for Bond director Peter Hunt), The Wild Geese (opposite Richard Burton), Shout at the Devil (with Lee Marvin), North Sea Hijack (aka Ffolkes, with Bond alumni David Hedison and George Baker), and The Sea Wolves (with Patrick Macnee and David Niven). He even found time to, unlikely though it may seem, play Sherlock Holmes on TV, in Sherlock Holmes in New York with Macnee as Watson and John Huston as Professor Moriarty. All of these movies are well worth watching. He also displayed that considerable gift for comedy in Cannonball Run (sending up his own image as an Aston Martin-driving racer who thinks he’s Roger Moore) and Blake Edwards’ Curse of the Pink Panther (1983). While the latter is a pretty lousy movie, Moore elevates it considerably in his brief cameo as a post-plastic surgery Inspector Clouseau, ably aping Peter Sellers’ famous French accent and pulling off the requisite pratfalls with great aplomb. (You can watch his scene on YouTube, saving yourself from slogging through the entire film.) In my opinion he’s the only actor to ever successfully fill Sellers’ shoes in that role (once again demonstrating his ability to rise to the challenge following in famous footsteps), and it’s a real shame that Edwards didn’t make Moore’s Clouseau the star of the film.

Moore played James Bond in seven official entries in the series, more than any other actor (though tied with Connery if you count the unofficial Never Say Never Again), and until he was 57, making him the oldest actor to play 007. Too old, really. Moore himself was the first to admit that A View to a Kill was at least one movie too many, and stretched credibility when he switched off with stuntmen for the outlandish action. He had actually tried to leave the series, but Broccoli simply offered him too much money to pass up.

After finally hanging up the Walther PPK, Moore focused more on charity than acting, devoting much of his time to children’s health as a Goodwill Ambassador for UNICEF. (His friend Audrey Helpburn had recruited him to the cause.) He played two more spy roles (in The Enemy, based on a Desmond Bagley novel, and as a guest star on J.J. Abrams’ TV show Alias), and made an intriguing mystery for director Bill Condon, The Man Who Wouldn’t Die, but primarily focused on comedy when he did act. His comedic roles included Bullseye! (an unfortunate miss, but an opportunity to star with his good friend Michael Caine), Boat Trip (an awful movie in which Moore is nonetheless hilarious), and Spice World. The latter was the first of several cameos sending up his Bond image. More recently, he starred in a Lifetime holiday movie, A Princess for Christmas, and played an important supporting role in the unsold pilot for a new version of The Saint starring Adam Rayner. (Sadly, that remains unreleased.) He also found time to record many excellent DVD commentaries, and to pen three memoirs (co-authored with Gareth Owen), My Word is My Bond, Bond on Bond, and One Lucky Bastard. My Word is My Bond is essential reading for any 007 fan, and one of my very favorite showbiz autobiographies, full of humorous and typically self-deprecating anecdotes from Moore’s amazing life.

With Roger Moore’s passing, we have lost one of the true titans of the spy genre, and a very talented comedic actor who never got proper credit for those talents. Fortunately, that Roger Moore brand will live on in his incredible body of work, preserved for posterity on DVD and Blu-ray and no doubt all formats to come. There is truth to the criticism that his Bond movies aren’t so much Bond movies as “Roger Moore movies.” But so what? I find myself frequently craving Roger Moore movies, and I don’t expect that will ever change. It may well be that I'm a bit more of a Roger Moore fan than I am a James Bond fan. Roger Moore was truly one of my heroes, and I am genuinely crushed by his passing. But what a legacy he leaves behind!

*Moore, Roger with Gareth Owen: My Word is My Bond, 2008
**Pixley, Andrew: The Persuaders! Read and Destroy: A Complete Series Guide, 2011

New Spy DVDs and Blu-rays Out This Week and Last

New Spy DVDs and Blu-rays Out This Week and Last

I still haven't seen the BBC period drama The Hour (which weaves spy elements into a journalism story), starring Romola Garai, Dominic West and Ben Wishaw, but I've got it on my DVR and am very much looking forward to checking it out eventually. If you didn't record it, though (or don't get BBC America), you too can now check it out, too, because it's out on DVD and Blu-ray this week! BBC describes The Hour as "a thrilling six-part drama set in 1950s London when the BBC is about to launch an entirely new way of presenting the news. The dynamic Bel (Garai) is chosen to produce the new program, to be called "The Hour," with handsome and well connected Hector (West) set to become the anchor, much to the annoyance of Freddie (Whishaw), a brilliant and outspoken journalist, whose passion continually lands him in trouble. Over the six episodes, the interplay of intense ambitions between our rising news team play out against the backdrop of a mysterious murder and Freddie's controversial and dangerous investigation." Extras on these 2-disc sets include a behind-the-scenes featurette and an "Era Special" about Fifties style. The DVD will run you $34.98; SRP for the Blu-ray is $39.98. Of course, both are available cheaper at various online retailers.

Also this week in the category of not-quite-spy but certainly spy-related, The Criterion Collection brings us DVD and Blu-ray editions of Olivier Assayas' 2010 epic Carlos. If you were annoyed that the Matt Damon films of Robert Ludlum's Jason Bourne novels omitted the notorious real-life terrorist who served as Bourne's primary antagonist in the books, this 339-minute opus is sure to deliver all the Ilich Ramírez Sanchez action you could possibly desire. Carlos tracks the man better known as Carlos the Jackal (a nickname given by the press and inspired by another spy novel, Frederick Forsyth's The Day of the Jackal) in what Criterion's copy describes as "an intensely detailed account of the life of the infamous international terrorist."

One of the twentieth century’s most-wanted fugitives, Carlos was committed to violent left-wing activism throughout the seventies and eighties, orchestrating bombings, kidnappings, and hijackings in Europe and the Middle East. Assayas portrays him not as a criminal mastermind but as a symbol of seismic political shifts around the world, and the magnetic Édgar Ramírez [who, oddly, did appear as an antagonist in The Bourne Ultimatum, just not Carlos] brilliantly embodies him as a swaggering global gangster. Criterion presents the complete, uncut, director-approved, five-and-a-half-hour version of Carlos.

This release is the full 339-minute version that aired as a mini-series on European and American television (and is available to view on Netflix streaming), not the cut-down theatrical version released in some movie theaters. Besides Criterion's usual high-definition digital transfer (supervised by cinematographers Denis Lenoir and Yorick Le Saux), the DVD and Blu-ray editions include new video interviews with Assayas, Ramírez, and Lenoir, selected-scene commentary from Lenoir, the hour-long documentary on the terrorist's real-life career "Carlos: Terrorist Without Borders," an archival interview with Carlos associate Hans-Joachim Klein, a feature-length documentary on a Carlos bombing not included in the film called "Maison de France," a twenty-minute making-of documentary on the film’s OPEC raid scene, the original theatrical trailer and a booklet featuring essays by critics Colin MacCabe and Greil Marcus, as well as a timeline of Carlos’s life and biographies of selected figures portrayed in the film, written by Carlos’s historical adviser, Stephen Smith. That's a heck of a lot of extras! As always with Criterion, the price is a bit steep... but with all those extras, you'll get your money's worth! Both the 4-disc DVD and the 2-disc Blu-ray will un you $49.95 at SRP, but of course both can be found online at substantial discounts.

Last week I somehow overlooked the most exciting release of the week... Network's  40th Anniversary Blu-ray edition of The Persuaders!: The Complete Series! Not sure how I did that. (I guess it wasn't foremost in my mind because I don't own an all-region Blu-ray player. Can anyone recommend a cheap one?)  Like all of Network's Blu-ray releases, The Persuaders! is coded for Region B, limiting it primarily to European and Australian viewers and necessitating an all-region Blu-ray player for everyone else. The picture looks stunning (a vast improvement over any DVD version I've seen), as evidenced even in the promotional video we saw in July. In addition to that, Network has lived up to our high expectations of the company and provided a wealth of bonus material. Some of it was included on their previous DVD collection (which already boasted some pretty impressive extras), and some (most tantalizingly a new 156-page book by Andrew Pixley!) is new to this set. Here's the rundown:

• Digitally restored, High Definition transfers
• 156 page fully-bound book of viewing notes by Andrew Pixley
• Recently found, extensive textless material (including some behind the scenes) (HD)
• Previously unseen alternate title sequence (HD)
• Extensive HD image galleries of rare and previously unseen stills
• 1972 Sun TV Awards footage with Tony Curtis
• Contemporary French interview on location from 1971
• Moore and Curtis reunion on the Alan Titchmarsh Show from 2008
• Merchandise image gallery (HD)
• The Morning After - Remembering The Persuaders! exclusive documentary
• Commentaries with Roger Moore, Tony Curtis and production staff
• AVROSkoop contemporary documentary from 1971
• Top of the Pops promotional video for John Barry's theme
• Promotional spots
• Trailers and archive newsreel footage
• Tony Curtis interviewed by Russell Harty
• French titles
• Commercial break bumpers
• Script PDFs
• International movie versions and trailers for London Conspiracy, Mission: Monte Carlo, Sporting Chance and The Switch
• and more

Those "international movie versions" were feature films created for the foreign market by editing together two episodes of the series. They were previously available on the company's DVD set, as were the documentary and commentaries. I'm glad that all of that stuff is presented again on this collection, making it truly a complete package. (Well... almost complete. I'm guessing Network probably haven't managed to license the alternate commentary tracks recorded for A&E's Region 1 DVD release.) All 24 episodes of the fantastic series (probably my favorite ITC show) have undergone an HD restoration this Blu-ray edition.

The 8-disc set retails for £79.99. However, it can currently be ordered directly from Network's website for just £53.10. There's also a new standard-def DVD edition with the same 40th Anniversary artwork running £51.05 (£34.72 from Network), but I can't tell from the product description if it includes the new special features (and the book) or if it's merely a repackaging of the old DVD version. Sadly, I suspect the latter.

The Persuaders! Comes to Blu-ray in the UK

Network has announced a fall release for a 40th anniversary edition of The Persuaders!: The Complete Series in high definition. Of course, like all of Network's Blu-ray releases, we can expect this one to be for Region B, limiting it primarily to European and Australian viewers or North Americans with an all-region Blu-ray player. The picture looks stunning (a vast improvement over any DVD version I've seen), as evidenced even in the promotional video below. In addition to that, Network has lived up to our high expectations of the company and provided a wealth of bonus material. Some of it was included on their previous DVD collection (which already boasted some pretty impressive extras), and some (most tantalizingly a new 156-page book by Andrew Pixley!) is new to this set. Here's the rundown:

• Digitally restored, High Definition transfers
• 156 page fully-bound book of viewing notes by Andrew Pixley
• Recently found, extensive textless material (including some behind the scenes) (HD)
• Previously unseen alternate title sequence (HD)
• Extensive HD image galleries of rare and previously unseen stills
• 1972 Sun TV Awards footage with Tony Curtis
• Contemporary French interview on location from 1971
• Moore and Curtis reunion on the Alan Titchmarsh Show from 2008
• Merchandise image gallery (HD)
• The Morning After - Remembering The Persuaders! exclusive documentary
• Commentaries with Roger Moore, Tony Curtis and production staff
• AVROSkoop contemporary documentary from 1971
• Top of the Pops promotional video for John Barry's theme
• Promotional spots
• Trailers and archive newsreel footage
• Tony Curtis interviewed by Russell Harty
• French titles
• Commercial break bumpers
• Script PDFs
• International movie versions and trailers for London Conspiracy, Mission: Monte Carlo, Sporting Chance and The Switch
• and more

Those "international movie versions" were feature films created for the foreign market by editing together two episodes of the series. They were previously available on the company's DVD set, as were the documentary and commentaries. I'm glad that all of that stuff is presented again on this collection, making it truly a complete package. (Well... almost complete. I'm guessing Network probably haven't managed to license the different commentary tracks recorded for A&E's Region 1 DVD release.) All 24 episodes of the fantastic series (probably my favorite ITC show) have undergone an HD restoration this Blu-ray edition.

The 8-disc set will be out on September 19, with a suggested retail price of £79.99. However, it's already listed at a substantial discount on Network's website: just £53.10.

To promote the release, the company has organized a big 40th anniversary celebration event, "The Time and the Place." The guest of honor will be Sir Roger Moore himself, who will discuss his career and his role in the show. The actual time and place of "The Time and the Place" will be 6pm on September 10, 2011, at Kent House, Knightsbridge, beginning a food and drinks reception followed by an HD screening of two episodes selected by Moore, “Overture” and “A Death in the Family.” (Great selections, Sir Roger!) A Q&A and signing session with the star follow. Speaking of restorations, the original restored Aston Martin from the series will also be on display. Perhaps best of all, Network promises that "a special prize will be awarded to the person who attends in the best 70s attire!" A roomful of people dressed up in velvet jackets and cravats of the sort favored by Brett Sinclair and Danny Wilde would be well worth attending even without the presence of Roger Moore, in my opinion. As with the 50th Anniversary celebration of The Avengers that took place earlier this summer (another event like the London Kiss Kiss Kill Kill one that I meant to cover but never got around to until it was too late), I really, really wish I could be there. For those lucky fans who can, tickets can currently be ordered from Network's website. £40 gets you into the reception, screening and Q&A; £80 gets you “The Gold Napoleon” deal which includes all that plus an advance copy of the Blu-ray and an opportunity to have it signed by Sir Roger personally. Chances are if you're going to this event, you're already planning on buying it anyway, so why not spring for the Gold Napoleon? I don't mean to sound like a shill, but I know I would...

Now here's that promotional video showing off the HD restoration:

The Saint Reborn: James Purefoy Re-Canonized

Last weekend, Saint.org called attention to this enticing nugget on Sir Roger Moore's website hidden amidst his regular monthly Q&A: "I am told The Saint will film in July in New Orleans. I’m booked there from mid-July. More news as I get it." As far as I'm aware, the Saint to which he's referring is the latest incarnation of the ongoing attempt to launch a new Saint TV series, this time through a TV movie (and potential backdoor pilot) called The Saint in New Orleans. (This per a statement last December from sometime Saint continuation author and collaborator on the new project, Burl Barer, also reported on Saint.org.) But we've had so many false starts on this project over the last couple of years that I was hesitant to write about any of this until we heard something more concrete. Well, today there's finally something worth reporting on this very exciting project! On the CommanderBond.net forums where he's been carefully dispensing tidbits of information over the course of developing a new Saint show, Saint expert and co-producer Ian Dickerson has revealed the actor who will play the part—and it's a name halo-heads have heard before: James Purefoy!

Longtime readers will recall that Purefoy (Rome, Solomon Kane) was originally cast as Simon Templar back in 2007, when Barry Levinson was set to direct the TV reboot. That version of the project fell apart, and Purefoy moved on to the somewhat Saint-like series The Philanthropist instead (review here), rendering him unavailable for further attempts to get a new TV Saint off the ground. Dougray Scott's name was bandied about in conjunction with a later version, but in time that too collapsed. Now, years later, at last the stars have aligned and schedules have freed up, and it looks like Purefoy is once again attached to the project. Granted, it still has a long way to go before becoming a reality. Perhaps there's no cause for celebration until cameras are actually rolling (and Roger Moore possibly cameoing?), but, personally, I'm thrilled that Purefoy is back on board. That casting seemed so perfect. To me, he always seemed like not only the best but the only legitimate candidate to interpret Leslie Charteris' immortal adventurer in a new TV series. I hope everything comes together this time, because I can't wait to see his take!

And for Roger Moore fans, there's one other tantalizing tidbit buried in that March Q&A as well: Sir Roger reveals that in addition to the Blu-ray set from Network, there is also a new book on The Persuaders! in the pipeline to commemorate that series' 40th anniversary! Something else to look forward to.

Trailer For Network's ITC Blu-Ray Collections

Network posted a trailer on YouTube last week for their previously announced upcoming Region B Retro-Action Blu-ray collections, which will contain sample episodes from a whole bunch of Sixties and Seventies ITC spy/adventure series including The Saint, Return of the Saint, Danger Man, The Persuaders!, The Champions, The Prisoner and more.

I love it!  I love it, I love it, I love it!  This montage not only shows off what you'll get on these releases, but captures everything that I love about Sixties ITC adventure series.I could watch it all day.

Network Brings The Persuaders! And Other ITC Shows To Blu-ray In 2011!

Today Network revealed that the UK company would release classic Sixties and Seventies ITC series on Blu-ray in 2011.  (They tested the waters with an excellent Blu-ray Prisoner set last year.)  Since many of these shows were originally filmed in 35mm, they should actually benefit from high-definition transfers, unlike TV shows filmed on 16mm or video.  First up appears to be The Persuaders!, which, as regular readers will no doubt surmise, makes me very happy.  That series has had some good DVD releases in variously countries and regions, but it still hasn't seen a definitive remastering that shows it to its maximum potential.  Hopefully this release will do that! 

Even before The Persuaders! gets a series release, however, Network will release three sampler Blu-rays, under the "retro-Action!" banner, showing off select episodes (generally good choices, in my opinion, although I think there are better episodes of Return of The Saint than "One Black September"–particularly "Duel in Venice") of lots of ITC series in HD.  These samplers are all listed as Region B, meaning that they won't be playable on standard North American Blu-ray players.  (Many more Blu-rays than DVDs are actually released region-free, but that doesn't seem to be the case here.)  retro-ACTION!: Volume 1 includes what might be my favorite Persuaders! episode, "Chain of Events" (directed by Peter Hunt!), along with Department S ("A Small War of Nerves"), The Champions ("The Invisible Man," a great one) and episodes of Strange Report and Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased). Volume 2 showcases the color series of The Saint ("The Queen's Ransom," a great episode), the hour-long Danger Man ("No Marks for Servility"), Man in a Suitcase ("Somebody Loses, Somebody... Wins?") and Gideon's Way.  Volume 3 showcases the half-hour Danger Man ("View From the Villa," which was filmed in Portmeirion), The Invisible Man ("Secret Experiment"), The Baron ("Something for a Rainy Day"), Return of The Saint ("One Black September"), The Zoo Gang ("Revenge: Post Dated"), Shirley's World and The Adventures of Robin Hood. (Who would have imagined–Shirley's World on Blu-ray?) All three volumes are expected on February 28, 2011, and will retail for £19.99 apiece–though they'll each be available from Network's website for £15.99. 

This is very exciting news!  I hope that the series releases turn out to be region-free, though, because if they're not, I'll probably end up shelling out for a multi-region Blu-ray player.  The chances of American releases of some of these shows seems unlikely, though since A&E did put out The Prisoner and Space: 1999 on Blu-ray, I suppose The Persuaders! at least has a chance... Fingers crossed!

R.I.P. Tony Curtis

One half of The Persuaders! is gone.  It's with great sadness that I mark the passing of Tony Curtis, who died yesterday of a heart attack at the age of 85.  It's kind of weird that I've blogged so little over these past four years (four years?!) about the two spy shows I love the most, The Avengers and The Persuaders!, but I've just been exploring other, more obscure shows in the time I've been blogging instead.  Eventually, I will go back to those first loves and it will feel like coming home.  But coming home to The Persuaders! won't quite be the same knowing that Tony Curtis is no longer in this world. 

The Persuaders! hinged on the chemistry of its two stars, Curtis and Roger Moore (or "Curtis + Moore" as the pair were equably billed on the same screen), and their interplay is what makes it a favorite of mine.  I'll admit, it was Moore (unsurprisingly) who first attracted me to The Persuaders!, but I quickly realized that Curtis played an equal part in making it great.  And the show made me love him.  Sure, I was familiar with his more famous film work before seeing it, but bore no particularly strong feelings one way or the other.  But his performance as the freewheeling American adventurer Danny Wilde, impetuous, contrary and always gloved, made me see a different side of Tony Curtis and gave me a new appreciation for his talents.  In fact, I would rank his work in its pilot, "Overture," right up there with his most famous film performances.  The Persuaders! is likely to be little more than a footnote in most obituaries, but hardly anything better displayed the actor's great charm and wit.  Which isn't to say he didn't have a hell of a career before it, as well. 

For an actor who dabbled in many, many genres over the years, Curtis (born Bernie Schwartz) played surprisingly few spy roles (although he spawned a daughter, Jamie Lee Curtis, who went on to star in a pretty big one, True Lies).  Besides The Persuaders! (which, like all ITC shows, featured espionage plots with reliable regularity), Curtis' only notable spy role that I can think of off the top of my head was in the somewhat execrable Who Was That Lady? (1960) with Dean Martin and Curtis' then wife Janet Leigh. But The Persuaders! alone (even if his character isn't a professional secret agent) ensures Curtis a prominent spot in Spy Star Valhalla.  He can also claim (in a tangiential spy connection) to have worked with three Bonds.  In addition to working with Moore on The Persuaders!, Curtis also made The Mirror Crack'd, with Pierce Brosnan (in a very small, uncredited role) and the infamous Sextette with Timothy Dalton.

Curtis' early career, marked by lots of frothy matinee idol roles, saw him quickly categorized as a lightweight actor. Such generalizations, however, ignore some impressive early parts, like the title role in the 1953 biopic Houdini. Critical acclaim did come, though, for strong dramatic turns in movies later in the Fifties like The Sweet Smell of Success, The Defiant Ones (for which he earned an Oscar nomination) and of course Billy Wilder's classic drag comedy Some Like It Hot (a role he wasn't above riffing on later in his career, from absurd Seventies sex farces like the guilty pleasure Some Like It Cool - also starring spy sirens Marisa Mell, Sylva Koscina and Britt Ekland - to a hilarious reference on The Persuaders!).

He took some heat for his Bronx accent when playing in historical dramas and swashbucklers like Spartacus, The Vikings and The Black Shield of Falworth ("Yonda lies da castle of my fadda!"), but the truth is he's pretty awesome in them.  I love his performance in Spartacus!  Curtis himself was fond of pointing out that a stuffy British accent was no more accurate to ancient Rome than his own Bronx brogue, except that conventions had dictated us to expect it.

Curtis considered the Sixties the nadir of his career (up to that point anyway; he couldn't have imagined the Eighties!), which was revived the following decade on TV.  But many of my personal favorite Curtis movies come from that decade, including the zany race caper Those Daring Young Men in their Jaunty Jalopies, a terrifying turn as The Boston Strangler and my own favorite Curtis movie, Don't Make Waves (1967).  Seriously, when everybody else is paying homage this weekend by watching Some Like It Hot for the zillionth time, try this one instead (if you can find it).  It co-stars the luscious Claudia Cardinale and Sharon Tate, features an awesome Byrds title track and captures California culture on film better than anything from that decade besides The Loved One.

Tony Curtis was one in a million.  We've seen (again and again) the first half of his life unfold (in the guise of Danny Wilde) to one of the greatest theme songs of all time (courtesy of John Barry).  Now, for Persuaders! fans, at least, his afterlife is ensured to unfold to that theme as well, because with a show as good (if underrated) as that, and an equally imporessive filmography, Tony Curtis is truly immortal.

CD Review: The Zoo Gang: Original Soundtrack

I can’t remember if I’ve ever said this before in reviewing one of Network’s comprehensive ITC soundtrack sets, but one of the reasons I find these scores so appealing is because, being TV scores, they serve as sorts of digests for everything cool that’s happening in film music in their given era. Let me be clear: I do not mean this as a slight! That they are derivative does not mean that they aren’t creative. Quite the opposite, in fact. If the producers had merely slated in bits of existing movie scores or used total sound-alike bits, then they wouldn’t be fun and would probably detract from the shows in question. Instead, they hired very talented composers (including the great Ken Thorne, responsible for the music for The Zoo Gang) to synthesize what was popular, distill it to its essence, and regurgitate it in exciting and unexpected new ways, greatly enhancing the programs it accompanied. Because the ITC shows themselves were often reflections of big screen entertainment that was popular at the time (obviously Bond, but plenty of other influences as well), it’s only right that their music reflect that. There is no better capsule of an era in film music than an ITC soundtrack; what's going on in movies inevitably trickles down to television as well.

Case in point: The Zoo Gang. This short-lived series about a group of wartime resistance fighters now well past their prime but reunited first to bring to justice a traitor who betrayed them decades earlier and then to right new wrongs lasted only six episodes in 1974, but the incidental music for those episodes plays like “Now That’s What I Call Film Music 1974.” From the bold staccato track that opens Disc 1 and will instantly evoke George Martin’s first cue in Live And Let Die for Bond fans to the funky Paul McCartney theme tune this disc (like that Bond soundtrack) segues into, to even more funky, Roy Budd-ish action music to even the occasional T-Rexian riff, The Zoo Gang represents the very best in music of its era. The mere fact that Paul and Linda McCartney were hired to compose and perform (along with Wings) the theme bespeaks an ITC much more attuned to its era–and particularly the youth culture of its era–than the last time the company mounted a show about reunited war veterans more than a decade earlier in The Four Just Men.  That series about older heroes offered no concessions to the younger generation who would become television's biggest market; in fact there was an episode about how the remarkably out-of-it heroes couldn't even understand them.  A show with leads all in their fifties or above might seem like a strange match for a Wings song, but I think that was actually a canny strategy on ITC's part to lure younger viewers.  (Sadly, it seems to have failed.)

Disc 2 offers an equal variety of musical influences to that on Disc 1. Track 21 is a somber, even mournful orchestral piece that evokes Nino Rota’s score for The Godfather. The suspenseful, exciting track 24 (and tracks 36-38 of alternate versions) sounds like it could easily be torn from one of those great, funky Hammer scores of the early Seventies like Dracula AD 1972 or The Satanic Rites of Dracula. Other tracks offer the perfect cocktail of smooth, Seventies lounge music, akin to Laurie Johnson’s Jason King music (or John Barry’s 1971 Diamonds Are Forever score, to which I also compared Johnson’s music).

While there’s something to please every musical taste (well, at least every Seventies-leaning musical taste, anyway) on The Zoo Gang soundtrack, it’s by no means a hodgepodge. Ken Thorne (Help!, Inspector Clouseau) brings all of these disparate sounds together and skillfully blends them in service of the show. While I obviously appreciate the many different musical genres he touches on, the end result is very much his own. In fact, I think it’s the best representation of Thorne’s work I've heard on CD. (I have most of his officially released soundtracks save for that awesome-looking, super-expensive Superman box set that includes his music and his arrangements of John Williams’ music for Superman II and III.) It’s great original music, great arrangements of the McCartney theme and great music for the show itself. (To me, nothing better evokes the South of France as the ultimate Seventies vacation destination!) Furthermore, it all sounds great on Network’s release. (Even the alternate takes, amidst which Thorne can occasionally be heard talking to the orchestra–but far less detrimentally than the frequent vocal intrusions on the Laurie Johnson Avengers CDs–sound terrific, and don’t get as repetitive as some of Network’s sometimes frustratingly thorough compilations.) And none of these ITC shows sound cheap*; the studio didn’t skimp when it came to recording stellar scores.

I’ve said many, many times before that my own personal Soundtrack Holy Grail is Thorne’s music for The Persuaders!, of which we received one meager incidental cue on Network’s Best of ITC collection. It’s been said that the music is lost; it’s also been said that it’s been recently found. I choose to remain optimistic and hold out hope that one of these days, Network will release a set as wonderful–and hopefully at least as complete–as this one. In the meantime, though, The Zoo Gang: Original Soundtrack is as close as you can get. Even if you’ve never seen the series, if you enjoy Thorne’s work on The Persuaders!, you’ll enjoy this too. (Despite its older heroes, The Zoo Gang shares a similar tone and French Riviera location with The Persuaders!) The Zoo Gang is Seventies television music at its very best, and probably my favorite release yet in Network’s ongoing series of ITC soundtracks. This is essential spy music–essential for fans of the show, for fans of Thorne, for Beatles fans and Paul McCartney completist, and essential for fans of the studio and the genre at large. The Zoo Gang itself is a fun series, but by no means essential. Its music, however, is!

In Britain, The Zoo Gang: Original Soundtrack is available for £15.99 as a Web Exclusive from Network's site. In America, it can be ordered from Screen Archives Entertainment for $29.95. You can listen to a good representative sampling of the music here.

*A lot of Thorne’s best music is besot by cheap-sounding recordings. He wrote some wonderful themes for Lassiter–and I’m grateful to have that obscure score on CD thanks to BSX–but it sounds like it was recorded by a three-piece orchestra. The same can sadly be said of his Superman work (at least compared to The London Symphony Orchestra’s bombastic and enthusiastic performance of Williams’ score to the first movie), though I hear FSM has worked wonders to make it sound better than ever on that box set.

Network Announces More ITC Soundtrack CDs

Including Music From The Saint and The Persuaders!

UK-based DVD company network, who over the past few years have produced a steady output of fantastic, multi-disc soundtracks for a number of ITC spy series including Danger Man, The Prisoner, Jason King and others, have announced a new wave of CD titles. Whereas the original releases were sometimes up to five discs and comprehensive, sometimes including multiple variations on the same theme, this wave will be comprised of single disc highlights from each of the box sets. Highlight CDs due out November 2 include Man in a Suitcase: Original Soundtrack Highlights, Danger Man: Original Soundtrack Highlights (drawing from the company's two separate sets covering the original half-hour series and the later hour-long show, known in the U.S. as Secret Agent), The Prisoner: Original Soundtrack Highlights, Department S: Original Soundtrack Highlights and Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased): Original Soundtrack Highlights. Each of these single-disc releases will retail for £9.78, which makes them a good option for fans who really want all the key themes and a good flavor of the incidental score from their favorite series, but aren't obsessive enough to require every surviving cue available. (For those of us who are that obsessive, like me, the original sets will remain available.)

But the biggest news of Network's announcement is not the highlights discs. The real news is a two-disc compilation called The Music of ITC. Not only does this essential collection of cool music draw from all of the series listed above, it also includes "exclusive music suites from The Persuaders!, The Zoo Gang, Return of the Saint and The Baron that are not available elsewhere!"

While there are only four cues from The Persuaders!, I am thrilled to have even that! For years the only music available from that series has been John Barry's iconic theme! That theme is present and accounted for, as is the song that plays during the splitscreen chase scene in the first episode. Since Ken Thorne is credited, presumably that means the remaining two cues come from his score music. I'm also excitedly looking forward to the eight tracks representing Return of the Saint (Brian Dee & Irving Martin, John Scott and Guido & Maurizio de Angelis are the credited composers)! Other delicacies include eight selections from The Zoo Gang (consisting of both Paul McCartney's title theme and Ken Thorne's incidental music), three tracks from The Adventurer, seven from The Baron (Edwin Astley) and, finally, eight from The Saint (Astley again). The music from The Saint isn't described as previously unreleased, so I'm a little worried that might be cues already included on Astley's soundtrack album, but hopefully not... Overall, though, there are enough extremely rare musical treasures on this tracklist to have me positively giddy! I can't wait for this CD!

Of course, the hope is that the fact that Network is including these selections on this set means that they're hard at work on full-fledged soundtrack sets for each of these series, and this is only a taster. Here's hoping!

CONTEST: Win A&E's Cult Spy Collection!

This is the ultimate prize for Double O Section readers: a fourteen-disc collection comprising such fantastic ITC spy shows as The Persuaders!, The Protectors, The Prisoner and The Champions... all in one set! All you have to do to win a copy of A&E's luxurious new Spy Collection megaset (more details here) is send an email with the subject heading "SPY COLLECTION" including your name and mailing address to the Double O Section by midnight, Pacific Time on Thursday, March 5, 2009. Winners will be announced in one week's time, next Friday. This is the ideal introduction to all of these great series, as it includes A&E's first set of each of them. (For all but The Prisoner, that comprises half the series.) The Spy Collection is a great way to discover which ones you like (which will probably be all of them!) and then delve deeper later by picking up the second set. Good luck!

One entry per person, please. Double entries will be disqualified. One winner will be drawn at random and announced on Friday, March 6, 2009. The winner's name 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, although this DVD set is NTSC Region 1, so make sure that you have a compatible player. Unfortunately, the Double O Section cannot assume responsibility for items lost or damaged in transit.

New Spy DVDs Out This Week: A&E Sampler

This week brings the perfect box set for American spy enthusiasts looking to dip their feet into the vast pool of ITC adventure series, eager to expand their cult TV horizons beyond The Avengers and The Saint. A&E's The Spy Collection Megaset features the first sets (of two total each) of The Protectors, starring the man from U.N.C.L.E. himself, Robert Vaughn, and The Persuaders!, starring Tony Curtis and an immediately pre-Bond Roger Moore, along with half of The Champions (the cult show about secret agents with superpowers that’s currently being remade for the big screen with a script by Guillermo Del Toro)–which is all that A&E has released of that show to date, unfortunately. In addition to all that, you also get a taste of the ultimate cult spy series, The Prisoner with the first two discs of the renowned Patrick McGoohan vehicle (amounting to just three episodes). The whole bundle is a tad pricey... but much cheaper than what the individual volumes of these series originally retailed for. It's really the ideal sampler for discovering the wonderful world of ITC series. And if you like what you see of The Prisoner or The Persuaders! (which you will) or The Protectors (which you might), you can still go out and buy the rest separately. If you like what you see of The Champions (which you will), well then you're kind of out of luck (at least until the movie gets made) because that's all that's available from A&E so far. But at least you'll have it all! If you've already got these, then obviously there's no reason to get this set. But if you don't... then, trust me, this the coolest release imaginable, and a must-have!

While that's the only major spy release out this week, as long as I'm talking about new discs I'm compelled to also point out that my favorite Dario Argento movie, the ultra-rare, previously near impossible to see Four Flies on Grey Velvet makes its American DVD debut today! There's nothing spy about it, but if you're into gialli, make sure you pick this one up. You won't regret it!

New Spy DVDs Out This Week

But today is Sunday, not Tuesday! What's going on? Well, thanks to the Christmas holiday, studios are bumping their new product up a few days to entice last-minute holiday shoppers. Among those titles being released today is Focus Features' Burn After Reading, a terrific new spy comedy from the Coen Brothers. Actually, this is the ideal last-minute gift idea for spy fans! (And it's also available in Blu-Ray.) Read my full DVD review here, and my original review of the film here.

And speaking of Christmas shopping, while I was out doing mine today I stumbled upon an exciting new title that I must have missed when it debuted amongst the Bond-propelled spy glut at the beginning of November: The Persuaders!: 3 Film Collection. This set (which somehow slipped out from LionsGate) collects all three Persuaders! theatrical releases from the early Seventies: Mission: Monte Carlo, Sporting Chance and The London Conspiracy. Bear in mind that each of these so-called "films" is actually two episodes of the TV series edited together for the European theatrical market. Still, this disc will be of extreme interest to American Persuaders! fans because the theatrical versions have never been released in the United States on DVD before. (I believe some of them were included with various foreign DVD sets of the series.) They're notable for featuring different title sequences, though I don't know if there's any actual new footage in the films. (I doubt it.) It's also a good, cheap way for new viewers to sample this incredible Roger Moore/Tony Curtis series (really, one of my favorites ever) without shelling out for the entire sets. Beware, though, because some Amazon user reviews report defective discs. Hopefully this problem has been resolved by now. I think the cover is kind of cool, even though it's a blatant Photoshop creation featuring a cool-looking car that's not even appropriate to the Persuaders! era... but I still can't help wish they'd used some of the incredible poster art that was created for these films! I've spent a long time accumulating them from every country of release, and they're stunning images. Oh well.

Roger Moore's Autobiography Out Today

Ah, here we are: the first Tuesday in November of 2008! That's a big day, right? There's something happening today in America... Oh, yes! There is indeed: Sir Roger Moore's autobiography, My Word Is My Bond, hits bookstores today! (It's been available in Britain for a couple of weeks now.) You can get a taste of it by reading the first chapter online at Amazon, but why not just run out and buy the thing already? I've been excited about this since it was announced last year. Of all the Bond actors, Sir Roger's is the memoir I'd most like to read. He's just so funny and self-deprecating in interviews and commentaries; the guy's a good storyteller. So I can't wait to pick up his book!

Persuaders News Bites

The October issue of Total Film Magazine (on newsstands now in the US and featuring a reversible poster of both Quantum of Solace teasers on pack; Britain's already got the November issue with Daniel Craig on the cover) features an interview with Steve Coogan ("The Confessions of Steve Coogan") in which they ask him about the status of film version of The Persuaders, set to star Coogan and Ben Stiller in the roles originated by Roger Moore and Tony Curtis. Coogan first says it's in development hell, then, when they follow up and ask if that means the project is dead, he says no. The actor seems confident that The Persuaders will still find its time; that time just hasn't come yet. He says you've always got to have lots of different projects in development. I'm glad Total Film asked about that, because there's been very little news on The Persuaders movie of late. Last we heard, it was rumored to star Hugh Grant and George Clooney, but from what Coogan says it seems pretty clear that the movie is still in development with himself and Stiller as Lord Brett Sinclair and Danny Wild.

The original Wilde, meanwhile, has just written a new book (as has the original Sinclair, of course). Tony Curtis's brand new autobiography, American Prince: A Memoir, devotes just a few pages to The Persuaders, but does pack a few good stories into those pages. Among them are the oft-told tale of how he was detained at Heathrow for having marijuana and a handgun in his luggage (funny to hear from the actor's own perspective) and an amusing anecdote about filming the episode "Five Miles To Midnight" in which Curtis himself doesn't come out in the best light. Apparently while filming a scene with guest star Joan Collins, Curtis became frustrated with her and called her an extremely unkind word that starts with a "C." (Which, by his account, she was being.) When they finally did the shot, instead of playing her part Collins jumped out of the truck they were in and announced to everyone what he had called her, then ran off to her trailer. Curtis had to apologize in order to get the temperamental actress back on set. He still had to get the last word in, of course, and it's worth picking up the book to see what that last word was...

Random Intelligence Dispatches For January 21, 2008

Stiller Persuades Clooney and Grant?

This one's ollllllld news, but somehow I missed it last May, so I better play catch-up! Last I heard, Ben Stiller was developing a movie remake of the classic Tony Curtis/Roger Moore television series The Persuaders (my second-favorite British spy series, after The Avengers) to star himself and Steve Coogan as playboy adventurers Danny Wilde and Lord Brett Sinclair. But apparently news emerged from last year's Cannes Film Festival that George Clooney and Hugh Grant are in talks to take over the roles, with Stiller still on board to produce. I still believe that the Stiller/Coogan pairing could have worked (and it would have been cool to see Coogan realize his ongoing Roger Moore fixation by stepping into his shoes), but there was certainly a lot more potential for that version to go horribly awry, too, and turn into Starsky and Hutch 2. To me, Clooney and Grant leave a lot less room for error. (My dream cast for such a remake has always been Grant and Bruce Campbell.) Clooney is actually perfect for Danny Wilde, and an Ocean's 11 tone is just the right thing for The Persuaders, which despite its share of more dramatic episodes, was always first and foremost about fun. It would be great to see this version happen, become a hit, and spawn a whole series of glamorous spy action on the French Riviera! (And I can't wait to see a red Ferrari 599 GTB square off against a gold Aston Martin DBS to a pulsing remix of John Barry's sublime theme music.) Of course, it all really depends on what kind of chemistry Clooney and Grant have together...

More Jack Ryan On The Horizon?

Moviehole runs the rumor today that Paramount is reviving its Jack Ryan spy franchise with Ryan Gosling as the fourth actor to step into the role of Tom Clancy's action-prone CIA analyst(following Alec Baldwin, Harrison Ford and Ben Affleck) . The new movie, they claim, won't be based on a Clancy novel at all, but will be an original Jack Ryan film adventure titled By Any Means Necessary. This is a little bit surprising as, unlike the Bond series (whose producers have-with the obvious exception of Casino Royale-been creating original plotlines since Licence To Kill, having basically exhausted the Ian Fleming source material), there are still unfilmed Jack Ryan novels. Some of those are unsuitable for a younger actor (taking place after Ryan implausibly became President), but Clancy wrote Red Rabbit, about a younger Ryan, specifically with the goal of continuing the Ben Affleck-led series reboot. Oh well. This Gosling rumor comes on the heels of far more tantalizing rumors about either Alec Baldwin or Harrison Ford returning to the role.

Defiance Trailer

The first trailer is out now for Daniel Craig's next star vehicle, the Ed Zwick-directed Defiance. Frankly, I'm underwhelmed. Hopefully it's not too indicative of the actual film...

New Transporter Director

Not quite spy news, but as I've made the case before, essentially so: Dark Horizons reports that a director has been selected to helm the Jason Statham sequel Transporter 3. Olivier Megaton, director of the 2002 Asia Argento thriller The Red Siren will take the reins. I hope he manages to capture the same ideal "Roger Moore Bond movie" feel that Louis Leterrier found for Transporter 2. There aren't enough action movies in that tone these days, and while I wouldn't advocate Bond himself heading back in that direction, I like the idea of someone else doing it. And Statham's perfect for it. I haven't seen The Red Siren (though it sounds pretty cool), but I have seen Hitman, for which Megaton directed second unit. And I wasn't impressed by the second unit stuff. I didn't find any of the action scenes particularly memorable. So I really hope that Transporter [1] co-director Cory Yuen returns to his Transporter 2 position of "action choreographer" to ensure that doesn't happen here! On the plus side, maybe Megaton will bring along Argento to co-star. She'd fit right into the Transporter world!

Shooting on Transporter 3 is expected to begin this summer. If you need a Jason Statham fix in the meantime, be sure to check out the awesome trailer for The Bank Job. Again, not a spy movie (why doesn't he do a straight-out spy movie?), but something that looks like it will appeal to fans of The Italian Job and other great Sixties and Seventies heist flicks!