View from the Villa

An official at the United Nations has been murdered. He had managed to steal $5 million of UN gold and someone else wanted it for themselves though failed in that attempt. NATO agent John Drake is sent to investigate and recover the gold. A mysterious woman is his only lead.

A solid start to the Danger Man series. A reasonably short episode, as all of Season 1's episodes are, but packs quite a punch. There's intrigue, mystery, action and a nice twist.

Not having watched a 1960s action show for a while, the action scenes are a bit jarring: I forgot that until about the 1980s people didn't bleed after being shot!

Patrick McGoohan is okay in the lead role though his brusque manner can be a bit irritating at times.

The killing of a man who embezzled five million dollars of gold bullion prompts NATO agent John Drake (Patrick McGoohan) to investigate, and starts with the man's wife who doesn't know about him embezzling gold; their marriage was estranged. He then questions people around Rome to find the victim's girlfriend, whom he suspects will be his best lead, but no one seems to know who nor where she is.

A clue on a painting finally leads him to a country residence. It soon becomes clear others are in search of the loot,and will do anything to get it.

A cracking start to a great series which had Drake, John Drake prodding for answers about stolen gold, and in such a methodical manner- he's like a bloodhound and very professional- Patrick McGoohan is excellent as the suave hero. It's a neat story, and ends with a rousing fight scene.

"Danger Man" is a well-made television series, though some of the episodes (such as the first one, "View from the Villa") seemed rushed because such an adventure show really needed an hour-long format.

This episode begins with a couple guys beating the snot out of another guy--trying to get him to reveal the whereabouts of some gold. Unfortunately, one of them is too brutal and they kill the guy in the process of questioning him. John Drake (Patrick McGoohan) is brought in to investigate the death as well as the theft of the gold.

The mystery was interesting but also a bit easy to predict--simply because with only a half hour, there wasn't time to really define the plot and characters. And, because of this, you could easily figure out the various characters. But, the story was interesting and kept my attention. I look forward to the next show on the "Danger Man" DVD.

By the way, the weird town of Portmeirion, Wales doubles for Italy in many of the scenes. This is all the more fascinating when you consider that this strangely designed town was used for the filming of McGoohan's later series "The Prisoner". I was in Wales recently and wanted to visit the place but was shocked how expensive it was to enter--even after all these decades. Also, I could be wrong, but I think that Barbara Shelley was dubbed. If not, then she created a great Italian accent, as she's British.

Patrick McGoohan makes the scene as a suave, collected secret agent (man!) in this internationally minded series. It's not a great story -interviewing folks to track down $5,000,000 of gold embezzled from NATO, but Pat plows through it in style, with Barbara Shelley a bona fide guest star to get things rolling. Unfortunately, the casting of a villain worthy of that title is poor.

The violence is vivid but contained and overall there's an urbanity to the show that is appealing. I was surprised at how he managed to create a Bond image (first id, goes, "Drake, John Drake") before the Bond movies were made.