Our Man Flint

After Dinner Flint

Our Man Flint
20th Century Fox 1966
Directed by Daniel Mann
Blu Ray Zone B

Warning: Spoilers a-go-go.

Our Man Flint was one of my favourite movies when I was a kid in the 1970s and remains so to this day. Essentially it’s a ‘band wagon’ film, in that it’s trying to capture some of the box office magic which the EON James Bond movies had been doing since four years before. Once a popular version of Bond had finally been unleashed on a largely unsuspecting public (the films were pretty ground breaking in their day), everyone was trying to rush their own knock off versions out into the cinematic wild, with perhaps the Italians and French churning out many of these things. 

The Americans, also, did a fair few and perhaps their most successful were their spoofs such as the four Matt Helm movies, which were absolutely nothing like the books they were based on and starred Dean Martin in the title role, where perhaps someone like John Wayne might have been closer to the character as written in Donald Hamilton’s popular novels (I’ll be reviewing those movies for the blog at some point too, of course). Their other big contribution was the Flint series of two films (and, much later, a truly terrible, missed the point TV pilot which I’m not sure I can be subjecting myself to again for a review). 

The Flint movies were where the Americans really got the formula right and the writers must have had their tongues lodged firmly in their cheeks as the title character, Derek Flint played by James Coburn, out does and sends up, not just Ian Fleming’s beloved character but also the whole idea of the secret agent movie. It’s absolutely ridiculous but, because the leads, including Lee J Cobb as Flint’s former war commander and Gila Golan as the turncoat femme fatale, all play it absolutely straight... the silliness works beautifully until you’re left with an absolutely perfect storm of spy tropes, action and ‘I can’t believe they just got away with that’ gags. 

How silly is it? Well, it’s beautifully over the top. How about the idea of Flint, observed by his four female ‘assistants’, with just his head and feet resting between two chairs, his body suspended off the ground in this manner while he rests (which apparently is something Coburn was able to do and was filmed as was), stopping his own heart for three hours and woken only when a little metronomic attachment comes out of his watch and starts his pulse ticking over again. Or the scene where he kills a fly in a room with a blow dart. Or the scene where he attacks two of the guards at the headquarters of ZOWIE (Zonal Organization for World Intelligence and Espionage) because he realises they are imposters... as he recognises they are wearing Battle Of The Bulge medals. But wait, “there’s no such as Battle Of The Bulge ribbons”... “exactly!” Yeah, brilliantly silly. 

Or how about the scene where Golan, dressed as a harpist, uses the strings of a harp to launch a poisoned dart at Flint, only to hit his boss Cramden (Cobb)... Flint grabs one of his keys, presses a button and a blade pops out the end so he can cut the poison out of the fallen man. A little later, he saves another man’s life by removing a light bulb from an overhead fitting, jamming Cramden’s fingers into it and then using his and Cramden’s body to pass the electrical current into a fallen victim to restart his heart. 

But while all this silliness is going on... and it’s great fun... there’s also a level of ‘over the top’ procedural, as Flint follows a trail of bizarre clues that nobody else on the planet would ever find, to lead him to the enemy threatening the world (known as GALAXY). There’s also a level of ingenuity in terms of how far the gadgetry and inventiveness of the film goes which, for my money, elevates this movie far above the Bond films. I love the Bond series but, for me, the Flint films are the absolute epitome of the spy genre... along with The IPCRESS File (reviewed here) and The Quiller Memorandum (reviewed here). 

For instance, in addition to the key blade, his watch has a rim which can be pulled up at an angle and combined with his pen to form a miniature microscope on his wrist with which he can analyse physical clues. And, of course, his cigarette lighter which contains 82 different weapons... this last item is first revealed in response to Cramden who is trying to equip Flint for the field, with a variety of things which are all refused by Flint. And this is one scene of many where the film doesn’t just spoof the Bond films, it blatantly calls them out...

So, after offering Flint a Walter PPK (Bond’s gun, acquired at the start of both the film and novel of Dr. No (reviewed here), after his Beretta failed him on a previous assignment, he tries to give Flint a briefcase which, with its retractable knives, is clearly modelled on the one in From Russia With Love (reviewed here). But the Bond riffs don’t stop there...

There’s a whole fight scene as Flint and another agent, 0008 (triple oh eight clearly being a riff but one better on 007), exchange intelligence information under cover of exchanging blows in a fist fight. The actor Robert Gunner is made up to look just like Sean Connery (the resemblance is uncanny) and he puts on a Scottish accent to complete the caricature. And during that fight, 0008 clearly states that it’s not SPECTRE behind the threat to the world. Later on in the movie, when Gila Golan’s character is reading a book of The Adventures Of 0008, Jerry Goldsmith’s soundtrack quotes the four base line notes of part of John Barry’s contribution to Monty Norman’s original Bond theme, which I guess is just about as much as they could have gotten away with here without facing a lawsuit. 

And talking about that score. I don’t remember quite when my fascination with soundtrack music began, probably when I first saw the Flash Gordon serials but, Jerry Goldsmith’s absolutely stonking scores for Our Man Flint and its sequel In Like Flint really captivated me as a young ‘un and I still put the insubstantial (can we have an expanded version please Varese?) but absolutely amazing scores on for a spin at least a few times every year. It’s fantastic stuff and the original studio album recording (which is also way different but equally brilliant) featured a track, Galaxy A-Go-Go, which was co-written by a young Randy Newman.

Okay, I think that’s me done with Our Man Flint for the time being. There’s a scene were Flint quickly browns his face up, grabs a revolving towel out of its housing in a bathroom and uses it as a turban to appear Indian at one point which, I suspect, wouldn’t go down great with today’s overly politically correct crowd. But, who cares, it’s just a fun moment and it’s certainly not meant as a mockery in the context of the scene. And I have to say that, rather than pay out way too much money for a very pricey limited US edition, I found more or less the same Blu Ray edition in a French disc (and the second movie) and, although there are no extras (that’s okay, I have two different DVDs of the movie with different extras anyway), I have to say that I’ve never seen the films looking this good. And it’s the full cinemascope frame as always but in a stunning transfer so you can pick up little details you might have missed before. For instance, it’s not even made much of but, when Flint sends a GALAXY guard falling to his death, a quick look down at the body shows his hard hat spinning round and around on the floor at the left of the shot, which I’d never noticed before. 

All in all then, the Flint films are absolutely exceptional and, especially Our Man Flint. I’m not sure why these films aren’t being made more of these days. There’s no Blu Ray release in the UK, the US one was a blink and you’ll miss it affair and even the French editions I have were hard to get for the right price. These films deserve to find a new audience with a younger generation of film goers and, as far as I’m concerned, are absolutely essential viewing for any cinephile worth their salt.