A co-production between France, Italy and West Germany, this is also known as The Secret of Dr. Mabuse. Maj. Bob Anders (Peter van Eyck, who despite his character’s name keeps coming back to fight Dr. Mabuse; here he’s renamed so they don’t have to pay Bryan Edgar Wallace again) is investigating a death ray created by Prof. Larsen (O.E. Hasse), but he’s not the only one interested. Mabuse (Wolfgang Preiss has his name in the credits, but he isn’t in this) remains alive, somehow.

Directed by Argentine director Hugo Fregone — who also made Los Monstruos del Terror — and Victor De Santis, and written by Ladislas Fodor, this gets ahead of Bond by having a spy boss named Admiral Quency (Leo Genn) — kind of Q, I guess, right? — who has a burned face, an eyepatch, a wooden arm, and a team of scuba troopers way before Thunderball. Four years after the new Dr. Mabuse started, worried about the paranoia of the post-war era, we’re suddenly in Eurospy territory. There are also three gorgeous women — Gilda Larsen (Yvonne Fourneaux), Judy (Rika Dialina) and Mercedes (Yoko Tani) — to flirt, fight and/or be saved by the hero, who everyone knows is a spy and he’s clueless to figure out why.

The Italian version, I raggi mortali del Dr. Mabuse, is 17 minutes longer yet seemingly moves faster. It also has an alternate edit. Choose that version when you watch this.

The Eureka box set Mabuse Lives! includes this movie, an introduction by genre film expert and Video Watchdog founder Tim Lucas, a new 1080p presentation from a 2K restoration of the original film elements undertaken by CCC, a commentary track by film historian and author David Kalat, and an alternate ending. You can get it from MVD.