Early in U.N.C.L.E.’s four-year run (especially after it switched to color), when its popular appeal seemed bulletproof, their M-G-M masters figured they could spin the occasional two-part episodes into eight ready-made theatrical features simply by ‘letterboxing’ tv’s 1.33 to 1 Academy Ratio frame into standard ‘flat’ (1.85 to 1) for that big screen flavor. Regularly done for international sales, here they also played Stateside under new titles. What M-G-M didn’t count on was the show cooling off as fast as it did.*) This seventh release seems representative of the lot. Not necessarily a good thing as, with the notable exception of agent Robert Vaughn/Napoleon Solo’s trim worsted suits, and agent David McCallum/Illya Kuryakin’s floppy flaxen locks, not much held up then . . . or now. Director Boris Sagal does pull off a tricky train hijacking (a NASA rocket stolen by the bad guys), but what’s crucial in these ‘60s Spy-vs-Spy near spoofs is setting & holding tone. Here, all over the place with some aiming for fun, some aiming for funny, others playing straight, and a few going full tv BATMAN camp. The silly plot has Bradford Dillman tricking Solo & Kuryakin into helping him steal mad inventor John Dehner’s deadly Thermal Prism. With it, he and his religious cult gals can control the world . . . IF they can launch it into space. Maybe if they’d left the commercials in we’d have some real, as opposed to guyed, period flavor. Instead, it now seems neither fish nor fowl; just spoiled.
SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: IMDb viewer ratings give the two-part original tv version (THE PRINCE OF DARKNESS AFFAIR/’67) a 7.5 whereas the one-part movie release earns a mere 5.7.
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *A failed spin-off, THE GIRL FROM U.N.C.L.E./’66, sapped mojo from the original series, which never quite recovered its early buzz.
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