SPY AROUND THE WORLD (1966)

When police track Wendt (Peter Vogel), a suspected ladykiller, to the home of Professor Alden (Richard Munch) it's up to the good doctor to keep the suspect occupied until he can formulate a plan to turn the tables. Naturally, the psychiatrist's plan includes showing the criminal the folly of his ways... by relating a trio of tales designed to illustrate that crime does not pay.

Yes, you've got that right, SPY AROUND THE WORLD (aka KILLER'S CARNIVAL) is an espionage anthology with each segment unspooling in a different exotic-ish locale (hence the title).

In the first segment (set in Vienna), a desperate woman seeks out suave man of mystery David Porter (Stewart Granger), a debonair detective who is the only one that can solve her journalist brother's murder. With the help of his dutiful butler Karl (Walter Giller), Porter works his sources, runs afoul of a nefarious nightclub owner and trips up the killer just as he tries to eliminate the detective. The lighthearted segment succeeds largely thanks to Granger and Giller, who have a fun crimefighter/sidekick dynamic that feels like they're two guys who have spent way too much time together. In fact, I was a bit disappointed when their segment ended – I could have taken a whole Porter and Karl flick.

If you think the first story sounds a tad lightweight, SPY's Rome segment is downright comedic, complete with wacky sound effects, an identically-dressed gang of mismatched thugs, a Rosa Kleb-esque female villain, double agent Margaret Lee ('natch) and 60s-era spy gags like a record pressed on pasta that our hero, Agent Brice (Pierre Brice), eats to destroy.

Your overall appreciation of SPY AROUND THE WORLD is likely to go as far as your willingness to dig this middle segment. Once I took a deep breath and remembered that by 1966 the tide of espionage cinema had turned from the rough-and-tumble FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE to the jokier, gadget-filled world of THUNDERBALL I had a much better time with the flick.

The third, and perhaps best segment, features handsome, imposing Lex Barker (THE TORTURE CHAMBER OF DR. SADISM) as hard-drinking detective Glenn Cassidy. After uncovering a plot to assassinate the Brazilian president during Carnivale in Rio, Cassidy hightails it south of the border and impersonates the assassin. Klaus Kinski (complete with tiny moustache) turns up in a couple scenes as "Gomez", a sweaty Brazilian rebel.

(By the way, what is it with these guys? Kinski, of course, made headlines recently after his daughter Palo accused him of abusing her when she was an adolescent. While checking out details for this review I was surprised to learn that Barker, who died of a heart attack at the age of 54 while walking down a NYC street, was accused of similar horrors by Cheryl Crane, the daughter of third wife Lana Turner.)

Directed in workmanlike fashion by a quartet of directors, SPY is about as light and fluffy as 60s Eurospy gets. It has all the trappings of the genre – exotic locations, colorful characters, double-crossing babes, convoluted denouements, a cast of familiar faces – delivered up in a series of bite-sized nuggets. Like a series of uninspired but pleasant sandwiches I consumed SPY over three lunch breaks and that may have been the best way to digest it. Certainly not required viewing, unless you're a Eurospy or Kinksi completist, but you won't hate yourself if you do end up downing it.

Poster image via emovieposter.com.

Eurospy Poster-Gasm (and Bonus VHS-Gasm)

I spend a lot of time in my office here at home. Probably a good six hours or so a day, even more when I get immersed in a big project like I'm working on now. So I decided that while I've loved assembling my Kinski Kollection I haven't really been appreciating it. Sure, I have a few pieces loitering on my bookshelf but I thought it might be fun – and help me push the Kinski guide along – if the mass of DVDs and VHS tapes, along with the magazines and a few choice collectibles, were on display for me to see each day.

Hauling everything out and rearranging my bookshelf was a start, but I realized that I have so much Kinski stuff that's not on commercial DVD that I needed to replace my slimline cases and low-rent CD-style jewel cases with custom DVD cases.

Admittedly, finding poster artwork for some of these flicks, like THE PLEASURE GIRLS or MAN, PRIDE, VENGEANCE is easier said than done. But I had a fair amount of success last night and even stumbled upon two art archives that should appeal to a few of you trashers.

First up is this Eurospy Poster Collection. The guy who houses it -- David J Deal -- wrote a Eurospy Guide as well as a 70s TV horror movie book. If you scroll down to the bottom of this page you can find the links to some Komissar X and Jerry Cotton posters, too. But it was the Eurospy collection I found most inspiring!

And for those of us who remember the good old days of standing in the video store and drinking in the trashy, goofy, stoopid, lurid and fun VHS box art, you can spend hours at CoverBrowser.com. I immediately recognized tons of flicks that I passed up back in the day, only to realize now that those boxes houses Eurotrash classics I've come to know and love.

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September ER Update Includes a Handful of Kinski Reviews

The cool weather means things are just heating up at ER HQ. Check out the latest new reviews from the staff at Exploitation Retrospect including:

PLAGUE TOWN: David Gregory's nightmarish tale of backwoods Irish horrors

HORRIBLE: A near classic from George Eastman and Joe D'Amato

SLIME CITY GRINDHOUSE COLLECTION: Sinferno's look at a quartet of low-budget madness

STONE: The influential Aussie biker flick that helped inspire MAD MAX and THE ROAD WARRIOR

SACRED FLESH: historically questionable UK nunsploitation

GOTH KILL: tongue-in-cheek Satanic mayhem

And, not one, not two, but three Klaus Kinski Klassics (THAT MAN IN ISTANBUL, I AM SARTANA... YOUR GRAVEDIGGER and THERE'S A NOOSE WAITING FOR YOU... TRINITY).

Check 'em all out, not to mention hundreds more trash, horror and exploitation faves at Exploitation Retrospect: The Journal of Junk Culture and Fringe Media.

Legendary Eurotrash Producer Harry Alan Towers Dies

If you're even a casual fan of the world of Eurotrash cinema and B-movies you're familiar with the name Harry Alan Towers. Towers, who died on July 31 after a short illness, was 88-years-old and had a filmography as long as both your arms.

Towers, frequently credited under the pseudonym Peter Welbeck, got his start producing televisions shows in the mid-50s and later moved into movies, a move which brought him into contact with such legendary genre personalities as Jess Franco and Klaus Kinski.

Kinski and Towers would work together repeatedly through the years, including such flicks as CIRCUS OF FEAR (an excellent krimi set in a circus), OUR MAN IN MARRAKESH (featuring Kinski and Tony Randall!), and THE MILLION EYES OF SUMURU as well as the Kinski/Franco collaborations MARQUIS DE SADE: JUSTINE, VENUS IN FURS (co-starring Towers' wife Maria Rohm) and EL CONDE DRACULA.

Over the last three decades Towers was still going strong working on such such films as AMERICAN NINJA 3, THE MANGLER, RIVER OF DEATH and PHANTOM OF THE OPERA to name a few. At the time of his death Towers was working on an adaptation of MOLL FLANDERS and was reportedly at work on a new flick featuring a character he'd brought to the big screen in the 1960s, Sax Rohmer's legendary Fu-Manchu.

Kinski Co-Star Pinkas Braun Dies

Just heard from Holger over at Hammer and Beyond that actor Pinkas Braun has died at the age of 85. Though Braun's name might not be instantly recognizable, fans of Eurotrash films (especially Edgar Wallace krimis) will recognize his face from such films as THE DOOR WITH SEVEN LOCKS, MARK OF THE TORTOISE and THE SECRET OF THE RED ORCHID, all of which also featured Kinski as well as Eurospy outings (NEW YORK CALLING SUPERDRAGON), spaghetti westerns (CLINT, THE NEVADA'S LONER) and the star-studded Sidney Sheldon adaptation BLOODLINE.

THAT MAN IN ISTANBUL (1965)

Nasty criminal types (including Klaus Kinski as Dr. Schenck) with plans for world domination through nuclear arms try to throw off Uncle Sam by blowing up a plane carrying two government agents and what appears to be Professor Pendergast (Umberto Raho), a nuclear scientist who was being held for $1 million ransom. Luckily, the faux scientist's foot survived the blast (!) and quick-thinking American agents realize that they've been duped. Saucy FBI agent Kenny (Sylva Koscina) and her magnificent 60s breasts recognize American ex-pat Tony Massinas (Horst Bucholz) in one of the surveillance photos and she sets off to Istanbul to see how the nightclub-owning playboy is involved in the scheme.

Turns out Masssinas isn't involved and though he has no love lost for the country that booted him out and killed his father, the thought of recovering the $1 million dollar ransom spurs him into action. Pretty soon he's helping Kenny sift through a United Nations of bad guys to get to the bottom of things, save the professor and find the dough.

Actually, despite her FBI pedigree it seems like Tony's the one doing all the work and Koscina sadly disappears for large chunks of the action. At least the producers know to throw us some more eye candy every now and then and we're treated to the equally curvy Perrette Pradier as the mysterious Elisabeth Furst as well as numerous scenes set around swimming pools and bath houses.

Clocking in at almost two hours, THAT MAN IN ISTANBUL suffers from not knowing when to quit. The first hour is quite entertaining, complete with the ransom exchange gone horribly wrong, a winning performance from Bucholz as the smug man of action, and some action sequences worthy of a certain popular 60s spy franchise. (Even the score by Georges Gararentz will remind viewers of the globe-hopping pop orchestration found in the Bond flicks.) We even get Koscina stripping down to her bra and panties for an evaluation by Massinas and his trusty sidekicks Bogo and Brain. (I kid you not.) After looking her over and declaring they'd seen better the trio dub her "Miss Babyfat," a nickname that sticks throughout the flick.

Unfortunately, the first hour's cinematic goodwill gets thrown out the window and the flick puts Tony into one predicament too many as the story lurches towards the finale. And even then the producers don't feel like we've gotten our money's worth and treat us to an additional ten minutes that might as well have a 'Tacked On Epilogue' title card before it.

Fellow Kinski fans shouldn't get too excited by the actor's appearance in the pre-credit ransom sequence. Sure, we get some sinister dial twisting from the star, but he's MIA for the next hour or so. But when he returns for an energetic fight scene with anti-hero Massinas you'll be glad he did. How anyone could have seen this film at the time and not cast him as a villain or henchman in a Bond flick is beyond me. A small supporting role, but the man leaves his mark.

I don't have a ton of Eurospy experience to compare THAT MAN to but I'd give it a grudging recommendation based on the action sequences, great locations, curvy 60s eye candy, top-notch supporting Klaus, and a sense of fun without being insulting.