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Post by severance on Jun 21, 2014 16:01:45 GMT
Further to the mention of "Deadlier Than the Male" in the 'What Have You Been Watching' thread, I thought I'd make a thread on the novelization: I have recently been you-tubing as we're decorating and the TV is in the spare room, with dvd's hidden under... something in a box, I'm not sure what... and I have discovered that our chum Timothy Mayer has a channel devoted to 60's spy movies, and a right interesting bunch they are too that he's unearthed. Not from his channel, but discovered through the suggestions side bar I've spent the last two evenings on Deadlier Than The Male and Some Girls Do, with Richard Johnson as Bulldog Drummon. From '67 and '69, they bear no bloody relation at all to Sapper and Gerald Fairlie, but are more akin to the standard Bond rip-offs of the day. Deadlier... is quite good, pacy and full of action. Oddly, the sequel opts for a semi-comic parodic tone, and is dreadful. It has the same elements, but no tension, weak jokes, and Johnson looks bored - well, you would be with that script. The only saving grace is Robert Morley in a brief turn as 'Miss Mary', a cookery teacher. he is, as always, wonderful, yet seems to be there for no reason. Like most of the characters. The movies are basically the same plot, yet so vastly different in result. There were tie-in p/b's for both. I had the latter, and it was even more disjointed than the film, which makes you wonder what the poor writer had to work from. Both were by Henry Rayment. I can find nothing else by him, but have a nasty (and unconfirmed) suspicion that it was crime writer HRF Keating earning a few quid quickly, as the HR stands for Henry Rayment. Of course, I may be libelling the late master. As Mr. Boot mentioned Henry Reymond (not Rayment) could well be a pseudonym of HRF Keating, but I've yet to see any definitive confirmation other than the HR. |
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