Where to Watch. But his accent was all wrongtaking the viewer out of the moment. Not terribly audience-friendly, but smart and very, very cool. When Quiller passes out at a traffic stop, the other car pulls alongside and abducts him. Elleston Trevor (pictured) himself was a prolific, award-winning writer, producing novels under a range of pen names nine in total! Berger is luminous and exceedingly solid in a complicated role. The Quiller Memorandum Reviews. Despite an Oscar nomination for "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?," Segal's strength lies in light comedy, and both his demeanor and physical build made him an unlikely pick for an action role, even if the film is short on action. Thanks in advance. He also has to endure some narcotically enhanced interrogation, which is the basis of one of the novel's most thrilling chapters. Soon Quiller is confronted with Neo-Nazi chief "Oktober" and involved in a dangerous game where each side tries to find out the enemy's headquarters at any price. We never find out histrue identity or his history. The Quiller Memorandum. But for today's audiences, those films are a bit old fashioned and not always very easy to follow, too much complicated. The Quiller Memorandum book. Dril several holes in it, the size of a pin, one the size of a small coin. But then Quiller retraces his steps in a flashback. The newspaper clipping that Hengel gives to Quiller, in the cafe when they first meet, shows that a schoolteacher called Hans Heinrich Steiner has been arrested for war crimes committed in WW2. One of the most interesting elements of the novel is Quiller's explanation of tradecraft and the way he narrates his way through receiving signals from his Control via coded stock market reports on the radio, and a seemingly endless string of people following him around Berlin as he goes about his mission. He recruits Berger to help him infiltrate the Neo-Nazis and discover their base of operations, but, once again, is thwarted. Is Quiller going to wind up dead too? I found it an interesting and pleasant change of pace from the usual spy film, sort of in the realm of The Spy Who Came in From the Cold (but not quite as good). The Quiller Memorandum, based on a novel by Adam Hall (pen name for Elleston Trevor) and with a screenplay by Harold Pinter, deals with the insidious upsurge of neo-Nazism in Germany. His job is to locate their headquarters. What will Quiller do? The former was a bracingly pessimistic Cold War alternative to freewheeling Bondian optimism that featured burnout boozer actor Richard Burton in an all-too-convincing performance as burnout boozer spy Alec Leamus. The premise isn't far-fetched, but the details are. The book is more focused on thinking as a spy and I found it to be very realistic. Scriptwriter Harold Pinter, already with two of the best adapted screenplays of the 1960s British New Wave under his belt (The Servant and The Pumpkin Eater), adapted his screenplay for Quiller from Adam Halls 1965 novel, The Berlin Memorandum. At lunch in an exclusive club in London, close to Buckingham Palace, the directors of an unnamed agency, Gibbs and Rushington, decide to send American agent Quiller to continue the assignment, which has now killed two agents. Very eerie film score, I believe John Barry did it but, I'm not sure. He sounded about as British as Leo Carillo or Cher. In typically British mordant fashion, George Sanders and a fellow staffer in Britain are lunching in London on pheasant, more concerned with the quality of their repast than with the loss of their man in the field! When they find, Quiller gives the phone number of his base to Inge and investigates the place. The story is ludicrous. The film was shot on location in West Berlin and in Pinewood . His two predecessors were killed off in their attempts, but he nevertheless proceeds with headstrong (perhaps even bullheaded) confidence without the aid of cover or even a firearm! He is the true faceless spy. Quiller captures the contrast between the new and the seedy in the West Berlin of the 60s and how Germany remains haunted by the sins of its recent past. Quiller would have also competed with the deluge of popular spy spoofs and their misfit mock-heroes: namely, Dean Martins drinking-and-driving playboy agent Matt Helm (The Silencers, Wrecking Crew) and James Coburns parody of Bondian suavity, Derek Flint, in the trippy spy fantasias Our Man Flint (1966) and In Like Flint (1967). The name of the intelligence agency that Quiller ( George Segal) worked for was MI6. Quiller reaches Pol's secret office in Berlin, one of the top floors in the newly built Europa-Center, the tallest building in the city, and gives them the location of the building where he met Oktober. In terms of style The Quiller books aretaut and written with narrative pace at the forefront. The Quiller Memorandum is a 1966 British neo noir eurospy film filmed in Deluxe Color and Panavision, adapted from the 1965 spy novel The Berlin Memorandum, by Elleston Trevor under the name "Adam Hall", screenplay by Harold Pinter, directed by Michael Anderson, featuring George Segal, Alec Guinness, Max von Sydow and Senta Berger. Required fields are marked *. movies. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. Quiller (played by George Segal) is an American secret agent assigned to work with British MI6 chief Pol ( Alec Guinness) in West Berlin. A man walks along a deserted Berlin street at night and enters an internally lit phone box. Each reveal, in turn, provides a separate level of truth--or, as it may be, self-deception. With a screenplay by Harold Pinter and careful direction by Michael Anderson, the movie is more a violent-edged tale of probable, cynical betrayal by everyone we meet, with the main character, Quiller (George Segal), squeezed by those he works for, those he works against and even by the delectable German teacher, Inge Lendt (Senta Berger) he meets. Our hero delivers a running dialogue with his own unconscious mind, assessing the threats, his potential responses, his plans. Max Van Sydow is better as the neo-Nazi leader, veiled by the veneer of respectability as he cracks his knuckles and swings a golf club all the time he's injecting Segal with massive doses of truth serum, while Senta Berger is pleasant, but slight, as the pretty young teacher who apparently leads our man initially to the "other side", but whose escape at the end from capture and certain death at the hands of the "baddies" might lead one to suspect her true proclivities. This demonstration using familiar breakfast food items serves to stimulate the American spys brainwaves into serious operative mode. His virtual army of nearly silent, oddball henchmen add to the flavor of paranoia and nervousness. The story, in the early days of, This week sees the release of Trouble, the third book in the Hella Mauzer series by Katja Ivar. It's a more realistic or credible portrayal of how a single character copes with trying to get information in a dangerous environment. I recall being duly impressed by the menacing atmospherics, if much of it went over my head. Although competing against a whole slew of other titles in the spies-on-every-corner vein, the novel, "The Quiller Memorandum" was amazingly successful in book stores. The Quiller character is constantly making terrible decisions, and refuses to use a gun, and he's certainly no John Steed. Blu-ray, color, 105 min., 1966. What Adam Hall did extremely wellwas toget us readers inside the mind of an undercover operative. The film's screenplay (by noted playwright Pinter) reuses to spoon feed the audience, rather requiring that they rely on their instinct and attention span to pick up the threads of the plot. Finally, he is placed in the no-win position of either choosing to aid von Sydow or allowing Berger to be murdered. I can't NOT begin by saying, "This Is A MUST Read For Every Fan Of The Espionage Genre". Keating. He spends as much time and energy attempting to lose the bouncer-like minders sent to cover him in the field as he does the neo-Nazi goon squads that eventually come calling. In the process, he discovers a complex and malevolent plot, more dangerous to the world than any crime committed during the war. The Chief of the Secret Service Pol (Alec Guinness) summons the efficient agent Quiller (George Segal) to investigate the location of organization's headquarter. Fans of realistic spy fiction will enjoy David McCloskeys debut thriller Damascus Station, newly available in paperback in the UK. [5], According to Fox records, the film needed to earn $2,600,000 in rentals to break even and made $2,575,000, meaning it initially showed a marginal loss, but subsequent television and home video sales moved it into the black. Unfortunately, the film is weighed down, not only by a ponderous script, but also by a miscast lead; instead of a heavy weight actor in the mold of a William Holden, George Segal was cast as Quiller. Create an account to follow your favorite communities and start taking part in conversations. One of the first grown-up movies I was allowed to go see by myself as an impressionable adolescent (yes, this was some years ago now) was the Quiller Memorandum, with George Segal. Fresh off an Oscar nomination for the mental anguish he suffered at the hands of Richard Burton and Liz Taylor in Whos Afraid of Virginia Woolf (also 1966), George Segal seems, in hindsight, a dubious choice to play the offbeat Quiller. Its excellent entertainment. Which is to say that in Quillers world, death is dispensed via relatively banal means like bombs and bullets instead of, say, dagger shoes and radioactive lint. Also contains one of the final appearences of George Sanders in a brief role, a classic in his own right! Having just read the novel, it's impossible to watch this without its influence and I found the screen version incredibly disappointing. This is one of the worst thriller screenplays in cinema history. No one really cared that Gable did not even attempt an English accent the film was that good. This is an espionage series that started in the '60's and ran through the '90's. Quiller, a British agent who works without gun, cover or contacts, takes on a neo-Nazi underground organization and its war criminal leader. Quiller, a British agent who works without gun, cover or contacts, takes on a neo-Nazi underground organization and its war criminal leader. Quiller, an agent working for British Intelligence, is sent to Berlin to meet with Pol, another operative. These include another superior soundtrack by John Barry, if perhaps a little too much son-of "The Ipcress File", some fine real-life (West) Berlin exteriors, particularly of the Olympic Stadium with its evocation of 1936 and all that and Harold Pinter's typically rhythmic, if at times inscrutable screenplay. He does this in a lone-wolf way, refusing to be hampered by bodyguards. In the relationship between Quiller and Inge, Pinter casts just enough ambiguity over the proceedings to allow us plebian moviegoers our small participatory role in the production of meaning. They have lots of information about the film, but inexplicably take ten minutes to explain how the Cold War conflict between Communism and Capitalism relates to . It's a bit strange to see such exquisitely Pinter-esque dialogue (the laconic, seemingly innocuous sentences; the profound silences; the syntax that isn't quite how real people actually talk) in a spy movie, but it really works. He walks down the same street where Jones was shot, but finds he is followed by Oktober's men. "The Quiller Memorandum" is a film with a HUGE strike against it at the outset.they inexplicably cast George Segal as a British spy! If your idea of an exciting spy thriller involves boobs, blondes and exploding baguettes, then The Quiller Memorandum is probably not for you. The novel was titledThe Berlin Memorandum and at its centre was the protagonist and faceless spy, Quiller. The West had sent a couple of agents to find out their headquarters, but both are killed. In the process, he discovers a complex and malevolent plot, more dangerous to the world than any crime committed during the war. They are all members of Phoenix, led by the German aristocrat code-named Oktober. The first thing to say about this film is that the screenplay is so terrible. The Mysterious Case of the Alperton Angels by Janice Hallett, Norwegian crime show Witch Hunt comes to Walter Presents, The Wall: Quebec crime show comes to More4, Irish crime drama North Sea Connection comes to BBC Four, The complete guide to Mick Herrons Slough House series. [3], In a contemporary review for The New York Times, critic Bosley Crowther wrote: "Clearly, 'The Quiller Memorandum' is claptrap done up in a style and with a musical score by John Barry that might lead you to think it is Art. There was also a TV series in 1975. In the following chapter the events have moved on beyond the crisis, instantly creating a how? question in your mind. Quiller also benefits from some geographically eclectic West Berlin location shooting from master cinematographer and Berlin native Erwin Hillier. All of that, and today the novels are largely forgotten. Quiller awakes in a dilapidated mansion, surrounded by many of the previous incidental characters. With George Segal, Alec Guinness, Max von Sydow, Senta Berger. He begins openly asking question about Neo-Nazis and is soon kidnapped by a man known only as "Oktober". Quiller drives off, managing to shake Hengel, then notices men in another car following him. In conclusion, having recently watched "Quiller's" almost exact contemporary "The Ipcress File", I have to say that I preferred the latter's more pointed narrative, down-home grittiness and star acting to the similar fare offered here. As such, it was deemed to be in the mode of The Ipcress File (1965) and The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (1965). The quarry for all the work is old Nazi higher officials who are now hiding behind new names and plotting to return Germany to the glory days of the Third Reich, complete with a resurrected Fhrer twenty years after the end of WW II. This time he's a spy trying to get the location of a neo-Nazi organization. On paper, this film had all the makings of a potential masterpiece: youve got a marquee cast, headed up by George Segal, Max Von Sydow, and Alec Guinness, for starters. Pol dispatches a team to Phoenix's HQ, which successfully captures all of Phoenix's members. Adam Hall/Elleston Trevor certainly produces the unexpected. I read a few of these many years ago when they first came out. This is a nom de plume for author. Summaries In the West Berlin of the 1960s, two British agents are killed by a Nazi group, prompting British Intelligence to dispatch agent Quiller to investigate. Max von Sydow as a senior post-War Nazi conspirator over-acts and is way out of control, Anderson being so hopeless and just a bystander who can have done no directing at all. He notices the concierge is seated where he can see anyone leaving. He manages to get over the wall of his garage stall as well as the adjoining one and then outside to the side of the building before detonation. This repackaging includes some worthwhile special features like an isolated score track and commentary by film historians Eddy Friedfeld and Lee Pfeiffer of Cinema Retro magazine to go with the new format. The film starred George Segal in the lead role, with Alec Guinness supporting andwas nominated for three BAFTAs. The cast is full of familiar faces: Alec Guinness, who doesn't have much of a role, George Sanders, who has even less of one, Max von Sydow in what was to become a very familiar part for him, Robert Helpmann, Robert Flemyng, and the beautiful, enigmatic Senta Berger. Segals laconic, stoop-shouldered Quiller is a Yank agent on loan to the British government to replace the latest cashiered Anglo operative in West Berlin. [6], The mainly orchestral atmospheric soundtrack composed by John Barry was released by Columbia in 1966. In fact, Segal as Quiller can often feel like a case of simple miscasting, although not as egregious a lapse in judgment as, say, Segals choice to play a Times Square smackhead in 1971s Born to Win. In . As for the rest of the movie, the plot, acting, and dialog are absolutely atrocious; even the footsteps are dubbed - click, click, click.
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