Atout coeur à Tokyo pour OSS 117

The fourth entry in the official French movie series of "OSS 117" movies, while a notch better than the previous entry ("OSS 117: Mission for a Killer"), still fails to engage viewers as much as even a second rate James Bond movie. There are a few things along the way to catch the eyes or ears of viewers momentarily. The location shooting in Tokyo, combined with an adequate budget, do provide a lot of pleasant eye candy. The musical score is also pleasant, sounding very much like the music found in a James Bond movie of the same era. And the action sequences are pretty well done. That is, when there IS action. There simply isn't enough action to be found in the 100 minute running time, which will leave viewers impatient for the movie to get down to business like James Bond. I think the lack of action can be blamed for a very slow-moving script. Surprisingly, James Bond veteran Terence Young had a hand with this movie's story, but you wouldn't know it. The story unfolds at a snail's pace, and another unfortunate consequence of this is that there is no feeling of tension, no feeling that people's lives are on the line. It doesn't take long for the movie to become quite frankly dull. "James Bland" is more like it.