Billion Dollar Brain (1967)

In this third film featuring the character "Harry Powell" (Michael Caine) he has now become a private detective who has been contracted to travel to Helsinki to deliver a package to an unnamed contact. When he gets there he is met by a beautiful woman named "Anya" (Francoise Dorleac) who instructs him to follow her in order to collect the remainder of the money he is owed. He is then met by his old friend "Leo Newbigen" (Karl Malden) who tells him that a super computer has devised a plan to foster a rebellion within the Soviet Union and that the package Harry was carrying contained deadly viruses intended for use against the Soviet army. It's at this point that things become quite complicated as various other characters and agencies become involved in this complex scheme. Having said that the film itself contains numerous subplots which appear with little if any introduction and eventually disappear with little impact in the grand scheme of things. As a matter of fact, even though the actors performed quite well, the story itself seemed to totally disintegrate in the last 20 minutes or so which really affected the entertainment value of the entire movie. On a more serious note, although Michael Caine has appeared in a host of additional movies—to include two more as Harry Powell in "Bullet to Beijing" and "Midnight in Saint Petersburg"—this was, sadly, the last film made by Francoise Dorleac who died in a fatal car wreck only weeks after its completion. What a shame.

Former British Secret Service agent Harry Palmer (Michael Caine ) now a private investigator is given a package to deliver to a man in Helsinki. Palmer''s suspicions however get the best of him. He discovers that the package contains live virus and is intended by some ultra right wing Texan to help him destroy the Red machine beginning with the invasion of Latvia. In the era of the secret agent craze Caine's Palmer was the anti Bond more scruffy than polished, the plots more gritty than glamorous. In this the last of the series it flirts with the Bond formula and falls on its face. Palmer's rumpled incertitude partially works due to the first half of the films convoluted structure but when dealing with a powerful megalomaniac with weapons of mass destruction in the latter third it becomes strictly a job for 007.Billion Dollar Brain's biggest misstep however is Ken Russell's direction. The idiosyncratic director's penchant for outlandish composition and expressionistic caricature are ill suited for action and suspense and his montages and tempo are flat and murky most of the time, his acerbic wit evident on occasion but out of place much of the time as it veers in and out of spoof. Billion Dollar Brain isn't worth a nickel of your time.

I haven't seen the intervening film "Funeral In Berlin" in the Michael Caine/Harry Palmer Len Deighton trilogy of mid-60's British spy-thrillers and so came to "Billion Dollar Brain" via "The Ipcress File" which I have seen and enjoyed. I was intrigued to learn that it was an early directorial outing for infant-terrible Ken Russell and it was certainly interesting to see what flair he could bring to a typical, almost mundane "Cold War" spy narrative.To be fair though, I found the whole movie pretty under-powering, not helped by a plot that seems to borrow more from the escapist world of James Bond than the workaday environs of Harry Palmer, I mean a deranged billionaire Commie-hating Southern US General with a private army and super computer planning to trigger a war by invading Latvia! I'm aware that Bond producer Cubby Broccoli was also producer on the Palmer films but believe he seriously got his wires crossed here, to the extent that we get a flashy Bond-type title sequence, tons and tons of expensive-looking military hardware (apart from the "cheap-as-chips" afore-mentioned super computer!) and a horde of extras who reach an icy end on the frozen wastes of Latvia.Contained in the over-prolix story are the usual devices of our man's anti-Establishment cussedness, cross and double-cross, love interest and the usual hero-saves-the-day conclusion, but in truth, rather like the snowy landscapes which proliferate in the background, I was left pretty cold and dreary by the film as a whole.Caine seems to show less conviction in his acting this time around and for me his style doesn't bond with Karl Malden's either, while Ed Begley goes over the top of Everest as the mad General Midwinter. Director Russell handles his locations well, gives us one or two interesting shots, like the initial scene where we get to see by torch-light the dishevelment of P.I. Harry's shambolic office and a scene where a just beaten-up Palmer comes around amongst a score of others like him, like so many broken dolls and yes, I did smile at the mild nudity scene which prefigures "Women In Love" by a few years.But as I said though, it takes a long time to get to the end, there's never really any sense of danger or suspense at any time and for me the actors all look confused throughout. Perhaps it's not surprising therefore that a fourth instalment wasn't commissioned after this outing.

A spy flick from '67 produced by Harry Saltzman (hold the Broccoli) with titles by Maurice Binder- the bad news is that Connery is nowhere to be seen! Instead we're stuck with Michael Caine in a buffoonish, distinctly-British 007 ripoff.You ever have a headache on a perfectly lovely Spring day? The air is full, the trees are in bloom, the sun just won't go down... but your throbbing head just ruins the day. This movie is that headache.I never quite got Michael Caine's appeal... he always seemed to be a benign British dullard- two steps behind everyone else in the room. Here he does his own Austin Powers impression as "dashing" secret agent Harry Palmer in black-rimmed glasses, crooked teeth and a shaggy perm. Whereas Sean Connery brought a raw masculine swagger to the role of super-spy, Mr. Caine looks ready for a shawl and warm glass of milk. His superior arrives and asks him to return to work and Caine earnestly pleads with him: "Please... sir... I... don't... want... to... come... back... to...work." You have just witnessed the most dramatic scene in the film.Director Ken Russell- before exposing his insanity in films like "Tommy"- directs here with a sprawling stupidity; in trying to imitate the Bond movies by-the-numbers he exposes the film's weak script and lackluster performances. Karl Malden- usually consistently wonderful- shows up as a panicky communist double agent. Palmer's woman has nothing on any of the Bond girls- she's short, blond, and wears black-rimmed glasses and spends most of the film berating him about his commitment issues.Michael Caine has the same look on his face when he's tied up and horsewhipped by an enemy that he does buttering his everything bagel. It's impossible to hate the guy, but impossible to love him, either. In fact this whole movie spontaneously unravels as it unreels... like a car crash... or a headache...I need some Tylenol.GRADE: D+