Danger Route

Richard Johnson is a hit man for British intelligence. Literally. He offs them with a karate chop to the neck. He's getting weary of the job and is thinking of leaving the profession when he gets another job. Whitehall wants a Soviet defector, but the Americans have him, so he needs killing. Johnson is assigned to the task. However things go awry. There's more at work than Whitehall setting policy.

There's a lot of Bondian elements here: the beautiful women, and so forth -- Carol Lynley, Barbara Bouchet and Sylvia Sims, and Diana Dors gets the cherished final spot on the credits. It's not just a Bondian romp at the peak of the 1960s spy craze. The darkness and betrayal lend a tinge of John Lecarre to the proceedings as Johnson slowly untangles the tangled web of the plot of the plot -- and finds himself snarled in its slubby mass at the end.

It a good performance and you can see why Johnson had been Terrence Young's first pick for playing Bond in DOCTOR NO. Although the movie works, his depressed character is, in the end, not terribly attractive; however, no one is.

To compare this film to 007 Bond films would to be lead readers astray.

Bond films don't have tight plots - this film is far closer to the films and series based on John Le Carré's works. The film is never boring and seems to finish too soon - one would have liked more time for the denouement.

And that is a sign of a good tight plot - when the viewer feels that the film has ended too soon.

The film shows how without any gadgets and spectacular action a good plot can still hold the viewers' attention.

There is action - fights and murders - but they are not spectacular - nor are they intended to be. They are cold, quick and quiet.

It is an enjoyable secret service film from the 1960's - a predecessor for the excellent Le Carré films and series.

Enjoy it!

Dors, Sims, Lynley. Sitar soundtrack. What's not to like?

A Richard Johnson flick is never a bad thing, especially in this mid to late 1960s era. Daft plots of charming British Bondish agents risking it all for Queen and Country, up against ne'er-do-well foreigners bent on global hoo-har, at all times charming the Kings Road Popsies.

John Mayer provides a cool as you know what soundtrack, niiiiice.

Watch this film and look back at the good times back in the day or have your suspicion that you were born to late confirmed.

An Amicus Masterpiece.

The director had come down considerably in the world by the time he made this potboiler in colour for Amicus, but it does reflect the fatalism of his directorial debut 'Nowhere to Go' and is far from the dog's dinner Betty Box & Ralph Thomas made of their two films featuring Richard Johnson as Bulldog Drummond.

By this time the more squalid side of espionage was already becoming a commonplace - even if Johnson drives a car with personalised number plates and it boast a title song sung by Anita Harris and rather exotic sitar score by John Mayer - so in Holt's hands the violence is both far messier and more intimate than usual.

This is another movie from the mid 1960's that sought to leap on board the Bond -wagon but for the most fell lamentably short.Richard Johnson - a talented actor deserving of better material-plays a British agent Jonas Wilde who is ordered by his superiors to kill a Czech scientist being held captive by the Americans in Dorset ,Southern england.the reasons are never wholly clear . The over complicated plot sees him getting involved with a senior British civil servant( Harry Andrews ), who vanishes mysteriously ; a double agent (Gordon Jackson)and 4 women who all -quite unaccountably fall for his charms .These are played by Diana Dors ,Sylvia Syms ,Barbara Bouchet and Carol Lynley

Wilde is ambivalent about his profession and would love to quit but his bosses will not let him The plot is twisty and too complex and while the odd scene is exciting and the acting is solid, mostly this is confusing and dull with none of the gloss and style of the Bond movies it aspires to be like