Wet Job

Looking at the reviews and comments there is a fact that seems to have slipped people's minds.

Wet Job is a remake of the original TV play "A Magnum for Schneider" that introduced us to the original Character of Callan.

As remakes go it's not bad and if you're feeling philosophical a nice close to the character.

That said like a lot of made for TV movies tastes have changed, production values improved.

But as a piece of nostalgia and a good introduction to Callan, and the very gritty 70s cold war spy Drama it's well worth a look.

Admittedly if Mission Impossible is more your thing then you're likely to be disappointed :D

Lacklustre drab and miserable. Amateur acting, dreadful , or was it just badly written screenplay , or was it just badly directed ? Which of those possibilities, or all of them ? Commplicated to the point of switch off and read a good book ! Admittedly I did not avidly follow Callan exploits back in the day so maybe , just MAybe this would have clicked as interesting ? After 30 minutes I opted out !

Just a note to one of the other reviewers (rev-584-459122), Wet Job is NOT a remake of the original play A Magnum for Schneider, which formed the basis of the Callan movie. This is a sequel to the original popular TV series in which an aging Callan has been forcibly retired from the security services, but is reactivated for yet another job. Though the performances of Edward Woodward and Russell Hunter and some others aren't bad, it's very poorly made with a tenuous plot, frequently incompetent camera-work, and irritating incidental music. Having watched it when it was first shown and again recently on DVD I suspect the production was hurried and with a smaller budget than it should have had.

For fans of the original series of "Callan" this is disappointing. It is of course, fantastic to see Edward Woodward and Russell Hunter working together again but the very poor plot, stiff acting in parts and absolutely terrible incidental music makes this a poor effort overall I think.

Hugh Walters is very good as the new Hunter and George Sewell is also a great addition to this one off. Felicity Harrison plays the new Liz, albeit only for a few minutes. There are very few action scenes in this and is focused mostly on the life of Callan since leaving his old job and the sub-plot surrounding Callan's landlady is actually pretty dire.

Overall, it is worth seeing if you are a Callan and/or Edward Woodward fan, simply to find out what happened to the hero, but don't be surprised if you are disappointed by this episode - a great shame, but it is understandable why this is unlikely to shown again.

There are some technical issues I have with this TV movie but mostly the problem for me is how this story would have been better as a 52 minute episode instead of an 80 minute made for TV movie. The story could of had more subplots going like Callan practicing shooting again and trying to hide the practice or who behind Hunter hatched this scheme in the first place since it was established in the series that Hunter is not entirely in control of The Section. I imagined Hunter lied about Meres on orders from Meres should Callan ask about him and Meres, now in the same role as Bishop in the 4th season of the Series came up with the scheme involving Callan out of spite. There does seem to be a personal motive to use Callan again like this but this Hunter never met him before.

The technical issue I have is the superfluous incidental music. It manages to undercut instead of enhance the impact of each scene. Maybe I was just so used to there being no music at all in most Callan episodes.

There was probably alot of fanfare around this movie when it first came out. The series was hugely popular. It had a fitting end to it but having the creator write about events ten years later must have been intriguing to many including me. The story fits and it wouldn't seem so overly sentimental at times if it weren't for that lousy music.