This is the second OSS 177 film, based on Jean Bruce’s 1960 novel Lila de Calcutta, which was the 74th OSS 117 novel. The series predates Ian Fleming’s Bond novels and the first film made from them was filmed before Dr. No.

Secret Agent OSS 117, Colonel Hubert Bonisseur de La Bath (Kerwin Mathews, The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, The Boy Who Cried Werewolf) is in Thailand after the murder of OSS agent Christopher Lemmon, who has been investigating plague epidemics in India. So, you know, if you don’t want to watch a pandemic movie, miss this.

Lemmon was killed because he found out that the medicine that Hogby Laboratories was making had been switched with plague germs, thereby killing much of the population.

OSS 117 then breaks into the secret lair of Dr. Sinn (Robert Hossein, who directed Cemetery Without Crosses), an Indian hypnotist and psychologist. Or maybe he was, because now he is wearing a cape and working for a group called the People Elect who wants to decrease the world’s population and stop nuclear testing. Why do I keep identifying with Eurospy villains?

You can watch this on Amazon Prime.

This is the first of three Eurospy films that Ken Clark starred in as Dick Malloy, Agent 077. This time, he’s on a search and destroy mission to take back Bloody Mary, a portable nuclear weapon, from the Black Lily crime syndicate.

Eurospy movies unite more countries than a world war, let me tell you. This was an Italian, French and Spanish co-production with an American lead actor.

Helga Line (Horror Express, So Sweet…So Perverse) is in this, as is Maryse Guy Mitsouko (who would later be in Thunderball), Umberto Raho (The Bird with the Crystal Plumage), Andrea Scotti (The Fifth Cord) and Erika Blanc (The Night Evelyn Came Out of Her Grave).

It was directed by Sergio Grieco, who would also make the Eurospy films Agent 077: From the Orient, Password: Kill Agent Gordon, Special Mission Lady Chaplin, Argoman the Fantastic Superman and The Tiffany Memorandum. 

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Seeing as how so much of Austin Powers was influenced by this film, it seemed natural to bring back this review, originally posted on September 1, 2018. This is one of my favorite of the Eurospy-influenced movies. Enjoy!

How do you avoid warfare in the future? The Big Hunt is the answer. It’s the most popular form of entertainment there is, bringing in all types of people who want to be rich and famous. Every competitor has to complete ten rounds of the game — five as a hunter, five as a victim. If you survive, you retire with more wealth than you can ever dream of. And if you don’t make it…

Caroline (Ursula Andress, Dr. No, The Mountain of the Cannibal God) is one of those competitors, using a powerful shotgun to hunt her final target. If she gets a perfect kill, right in front of the cameras, she’ll make even more money, thanks to her sponsorship from the Ming Tea Company. And that target? Marcello (Marcello Mastroianni,  La Dolce Vita, 8½), a man whom she finds herself in love with. The big problem is neither is sure if they have the right target and if you accidentally kill the wrong person, you lose the game.

From the jazzy score by Piero Piccioni to a scene where Andress kills a victim with a bra that has gun barrels inside it, this film is pure 60’s pop spy retro-future perfection. Director Elio Petri (A Quiet Place in the Country) turned Robert Sheckley’s short story into a comic book-looking film with incredibly gorgeous lead actors. Anne Margaret and Sue Lyon (Lolita herself!) were both considered for the role, but no one but Andress would have been right in my opinion.

If you’re watching this and thinking, this movie looks like Austin Powers, that’s no accident. The character of Austin Powers started in a Mike Myers music side project known as…Ming Tea. Yes, the very same Ming Ting from this movie. Featuring The Bangles’ Susanna Hoffs as Gillian Shagwell, Matthew Sweet as Sid Belvedere, Stuart Johnson as Manny Stixman and Christopher Ward as Trevor Aigburth, the band recorded several songs, including two that appeared in Austin Powers films.

The look of those films come directly from this movie and other 60’s pop art films, such as Barbarella, Danger: Diabolik! and Dr. Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs (it’s not an accident that two of Bava’s films are on this list, he had this look down pat). It’s worth mentioning that the film’s costumes were designed by Andre Courreges, one of the most iconic clothing designers of the twentieth century, who is credited with innovating so much of the mod look and is credited with redefining the go-go boot and inventing the mini-skirt (along with Mary Quant).

If you’re looking for this yourself, Shameless Films put out one that works on UK region players that has a lenticular animated cover. For those of us in the US (and elsewhere), Blue Underground has also released this on DVD.

You can also watch this on Tubi and Vudu.

As discussed in our review of The 10th Victim, Austin Powers came about as a result of being inspired by that strange 60’s precursor to The Running Man. 

Austin Powers started in a Mike Myers music side project known as Ming Tea, the sponsor from that movie. Featuring Myers as Austin on vocals, The Bangles’ Susanna Hoffs as Gillian Shagwell, Matthew Sweet as Sid Belvedere, Stuart Johnson as Manny Stixman and Christopher Ward as Trevor Aigburth, the band recorded several songs, including two that appeared in Austin Powers films.

Myers’ then-wife Robin Ruzan encouraged him to write a film based on the character. This movie, directed by Hoffs’ husband Jay Roach, is the result.

Myers said, “After my dad died in 1991, I was taking stock of his influence on me as a person and his influence on me with comedy in general. So Austin Powers was a tribute to my father, who [introduced me to] James Bond, Peter Sellers, the Beatles, The Goodies, Peter Cook and Dudley Moore.”

The funny thing is that Myers ended up having a direct impact on Bond. Daniel Craig credits the Austin Powers franchise with the serious tone of his version of 007. “We had to destroy the myth because Mike Myers fucked us.”

Back in 1967, Austin Danger Powers (Myers) was the greatest secret agent in the world. Teaming with the Mrs. Peel analogue Mrs. Kensington (Mimi Rogers), he chases his arch-foe Dr. Evil (also Myers, although Jim Carrey was who was supposed to get the role; Liar Liar went long and Myers took over. For what it’s worth, Myers feuded with Wayne’s World co-star Dana Carvey over the idea that he stole Carvey’s Lorne Michaels impression for this role) into a nightclub before the villain launches his Big Boy satellite into space.

Thirty years later, the world has changed. Dr. Evil returns to learn his henchman Number 2 (Robert Wagner) has gone legit, gotten rich and developed Virtucon into a real company. He also has a genetically engineered son, Scott Evil (Seth Green) to deal with.

An unfrozen Powers — who went into cryosleep to be ready for when the world needs him — is dealing with similar issues. Now partnered with Kensington’s daughter (Elizabeth Hurley), he must battle fembots and henchmen while dealing with a world where drug use and indiscriminate sex are frowned upon.

There are plenty of great villains, like Rosa Klebb-ish Fray Farbissina, Alotta Fagina (a Bond name if one ever heard one), Will Farrell as Mustafa and former MMA fighter Joe Son as the Oddjob-like Random Task.

You have to love a movie that has cameos from Charles Napier, Clint Howard and Michael York. Actually, I love this whole silly movie, despite disliking it the first time I watched it. I was in the wrong mood and with the wrong people. Now, years later, I turn to this movie as sheer comfort watching.

It’s so Bond that Dr. Evil has a cat, just like Blofeld. Mr. Bigglesworth is one of my favorite recurring gags, because when he gets angry, people die. Here’s some interesting trivia: the cat’s real name was Ted Nude-gent.

Beyond Bond, this is a movie awash in influences. Everything from the British show Adam Adamant Lives! to Derek Flint, Doctor Goldfoot and Get Smart! get put into this cultural mashup machine with very happy results.

There’s also a cut scene where Lois Chiles — Holly Goodhead herself! — cameos as the widow of the Dr. Evil henchman run over by the steamroller.

For Your Eyes Only was inspired by not just one Ian Fleming book. It has parts of Live and Let Die, Goldfinger and On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, as well as the short stories For Your Eyes Only and Risico. It was an attempt to move away from the silliness of Moonraker and get Bond quite literally back down to Earth.

John Glen was promoted from editor to director. His plan? “We had gone as far as we could into space. We needed a change of some sort, back to the grass roots of Bond. We wanted to make the new film more of a thriller than a romp, without losing sight of what made Bond famous – its humour.”

The movie begins with Bond laying flowers at the grave of his wife Tracy, whose inscription is her last words: “We have all the time in the world.” Soon, he’s attacked by a bald man in a wheelchair holding a cat. Is it Blofeld? Glen said, “We just let people use their imaginations and draw their own conclusions … It’s a legal thing”. After all, Kevin McClory owned the film rights to Ernst Stavro Blofeld, the organization SPECTRE and other material associated with the development of Thunderball. Bond bests his arch-nemesis and dumps his wheelchair down a giant factory chimney. Consider this scene a middle finger to McClory, as producer Albert Broccoli wanted the world to know that he had no use for Blofeld ever again.

This time, Bond must take an ATAC system that could be misused for controlling British military submarines back from Aristotle Kristatos (Julian Glover, who was almost Bond before Roger Moore was selected). Assisting our hero is Milos Columbo (Topol, Flash Gordon) and complicating matters are ice skater Bibi Dahl (Lynn Holly-Johnson, Ice Castles) and Melina Havelock (Carole Bouquet).

This is the only Bond movie not to feature M, as Bernard Lee was dying of stomach cancer during filming. Q has an expanded role as a result.

Originally titled Road to Red, this surf/skate/horror hybrid is all about five best friends who set out on a road trip that quickly turns into an epic battle for survival.

It was co-written and directed by Tito de Costa. It’s his fist full-length movie.

In the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California, a sheriff finds world skateboard champion Paul McGuiness’ abandoned car parked at a lake and his surfboard flaoting nearby. Some believe he killed himself or overdosed. His brother and manager Bruce sets out to learn the truth, along with four of Paul’s best friend. But now, whatever killed Paul is coming for them.

I’d compare this to The Descent, but there’s plenty of skating, too. It gets pretty claustrophobic at times, if that’s something that upsets you.

You can watch this on Amazon Prime.

DISCLAIMER: Wild Eye sent us this DVD. That has no impact on our review.

Mark Davis is secret agent No. 07. And he’s played by Mickey Hargitay, who as you may know, had a way with women. He was married to Jayne Mansfield, after all.

He’s looking for hidden Nazi treasure. There’s a clue hidden in a stolen Goya painting. I wonder if this was because Dr. No had Goya’s “Portrait of the Duke of Wellington” on display. That painting — which had been stolen from the National Gallery — was painted in a weekend by production designer Ken Arnold. It was used for publicity for Dr. No and then was stolen as well.

Mark attends an art auction but loses out on the painting. He soon learns that seven attractive women — each with a spy, art dealer or con men backing them — has one of the paintings. Now Mark has to use all his skills in art forgery and getting with the fairer sex to find the gold.

This was written and directed by Vincenzo Cashino, who also was in the movie as Barbikian the Armenian, a role he’d bring back for a sequel, Le 7 Cinesi D’Oro (7 Golden Chinese). He also wrote and directed The Sheriff Won’t Shoot and Le Sette Vipere (Il Marito Latino), which translates as The Seven Vipers (The Latin Husband). He was an Argentinian industrialist who moved to Italy to make movies and then disappeared after making these four movies, which are all filled with non-linear storytelling and plotholes so big you could drive a camion through them.

Lady Lister (Margaret Lee, Our Agent Tiger, Agent 077: From the Orient with Fury, Kiss the Girls and Make Them Die, Secret Agent Super Dragon, Psycho Circus, Slaughter Hotel, Venus In Furs…I could and will go on) has brought together five of the world’s best nuclear scientists and locked them up in her underground base. She’s followed the lyrics of a Gossip song and begun to turn coal into diamonds. But instead of her fists, like Beth Ditto, she’s using a controlled nuclear explosion.

If only there were a secret agent to save us all. Oh, there is. Special Agent 2.007 Dick Smart (Richard Wyler, who was TV’s The Man from Interpol). He has plenty of gadgets and lives in a time when getting rid of a veneral disease just meant a prescription.

He’s assisted by secretary Jeanine Stafford (Rosana Tapajós, who is also in Kiss the Girls and Make Them Die), who hides her beauty behind thick glasses and pinned up hair, but you know how that goes. She looks just like Stella Stevens in the Matt Helm movie The Silencers and also like how Sharon Tate would look in The Wrecking Crew two days later, so the strange notion of collective intelligence has made me dwell on this movie perhaps longer than I should.

Lister also works with another villain in a wheelchair named McDiamond. I can see why the dude wants more jewels with a nom de plume like that. He also has a voice box, because nothing is scarier than someone with two handicaps coming after you. He and Lister aren’t a team for long and he’s soon torturing her, which means our playboy protagonist must save her.

Have you ever seen a movie where the hero has an LBW? That’s a Locator of Beautiful Women, which beeps whenever a good looking woman walks by. I have no idea why a vagabond fake Bond would need such a thing or the maniac who would make it.

This movie was directed by Franco Prosperi, who started as an assistant to Mario Bava, and eventually made The Throne of Fire, one of my favorite Italian Conan ripoffs ever.

Want to watch it? Good news. I posted the YouTube link for you.