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    Home»Movies»Movies by Decade»Movies - 1960s
    Movies - 1960s Movies - A 2 Mins Read

    Assassination Bureau, The (1969)

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    This dry period comedy has ardent feminist and would-be journalist Miss Winter (Diana Rigg) infiltrating a gang of killers whose members only accept contracts on those who “deserve” to die.

    Rigg persuades the gang’s leader Ivan Dragomiloff (Oliver Reed) to allow himself to become a target as a challenge to his professionalism. But events are complicated by a conniving aristocratic newspaper publisher Lord Bostwick (Telly Savalas).

    It’s a clever premise but the numerous attempts by the bureau to kill Dragomiloff do not provide the laughs they promise – They are too numerous and make the movie repetitious.

    It’s also hard to laugh at these goons trying to assassinate each other when various innocent bystanders get blown up in the process. Still, the look on Clive Revill’s face when he’s poisoned is priceless.

    assassinationbureau_003

    The film does wake itself up in time for a fairly exciting finale, but by that time the clever plot has been too bogged down by a heavy-handed production, missing the light, daffy touch it so sorely needed.

    It’s a real shame because the ingredients are there for a colourful adventure.

    Loosely based on a madcap unfinished novel by Jack London later completed by Robert L Fish (with additional material by producer Michael Relph and Wolf Mankowitz), the movie is a long chase across Europe through chocolate-box Victoriana with a lot of traps, bombs and disguises.

    Diana Rigg’s appearances disguised as everything from a Victorian prude to a femme fatale to a nun, are delicious. This is a movie that cries out for a remake.

    Ivan Dragomiloff
    Oliver Reed
    Miss Sonya Winter

    Diana Rigg
    Lord Bostwick

    Telly Savalas
    General von Pinck

    Curd Jürgens
    Monsieur Lucoville

    Philippe Noiret
    Herr Weiss

    Warren Mitchell
    Madame Otero

    Beryl Reid
    Cesare Spado

    Clive Revill
    Monsieur Popescu

    Kenneth Griffith
    Baron Muntzof

    Vernon Dobtcheff
    Eleanora

    Annabella Incontrera
    Angelo

    Jess Conrad
    Mme. Lucoville

    Katherine Kath
    Bureau Members

    Roger Delgado
    Maurice Browning
    Clive Cazes
    Gerik Schjelderup

    Director
    Basil Dearden

    assassinationbureau6

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    Put some beefiness into your mid-week menu with these recipe ideas published in a Birds Eye advertisement from the Radio Times on 30 September 1965.

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