Dick Barton Strikes Back

Dick Barton Strikes Back was the second of Hammer's Dick Barton films to be released, but was actually the last to be filmed. It's easily the best of the three films, director Godfrey Grayson getting the formula just right, eschewing the comedy of the first film and largely avoiding the silly contrivances that ruined both Dick Barton Special Agent and Dick Barton at Bay. This one ups the seriousness and level of action and is all the better for it.

The result feels very much like a proto-James Bond adventure, with it's suave British hero (once again played by Don Stannard), a very Fleming-style villain in Fouracada (Sebastian Cabot), and a diabolical plot that sees the bad guys using a powerful sonic weapon of mass destruction to help their un-specified country to achieve world domination. There's even a femme fatale who turns ally in the form of Tina (Jean Lodge), and several scenes in which the antagonists have an opportunity to kill Barton once and for all, but instead opt to put him in a perilous situation from which he has a chance to escape. It makes one wonder whether Ian Fleming was inspired in some part by Barton when creating Bond.

After plenty of deft detective work, the main clue being a piece of jaunty gypsy music heard at the location of each of Fourocada's test sites, Barton tracks down the sonic device to the top of the Blackpool Tower. The final act is an exciting race against time as Barton fights his way to the top of the tower, past various henchmen, to confront the mastermind of the whole dastardly scheme.

Far better than the other Barton films, Dick Barton Strikes Back would have been followed by more adventures for the special agent, if only star Stannard hadn't been killed in a car crash shortly after filming - a real shame, because this one saw the series going in the right direction, and further films could have catapulted Stannard to super-stardom.

6.5/10, rounded up to 7 for IMDb.