THE SPY WHO CAME

This campy, ridiculous skinflick features a fun screenplay by Bruce Marcus and director Ron Wertheim, as well as slick black-and-white photography by Joao Fernandes. It starts off with an excruciatingly slow seduction scene but quickly becomes very bizarre. Policeman Harry Harris (Louis Waldon) is kidnapped by a mad gay Arab named Mohammed, who smokes opium from a hookah pipe. Mohammed has photos of policemen and U.N. delegates in compromising positions for blackmail purposes, and he wants Harry to arrest some of them. His castle has dungeons full of chained women whom he is brainwashing to entrap his targets, using strange machines, mannequins, and sexual instruction tapes. With the help of a French Interpol agent named Moreau, Harry sets out to turn the tables on Mohammed. Drugs, torture, and sadomasochism are featured, and although none of it makes much sense, this offbeat roughie manages to be a lot of fun. Neither as naive as the "nudie-cuties" which preceded it, nor as viciously nasty as many similar films of its time, The Spy Who Came is a surprisingly enjoyable entry in a mostly boring genre. Phillipa Reed, Jean Carrol, and Mitch Drake co-star in this Lou Campa release.