Peter Viney's Blog

Modesty Blaise
1966

Directed by Joseph Losey
Produced by Joseph Janni
Screenplay by Evan Jones
Music by Johnny Dankworth
Based on the strip cartoon by Peter O’Donnell (writer) and Jim Holdaway (illustrator)

Harold Pinter- screenplay, uncredited.

CAST:
Monica Vitti – Modesty Blaise
Terence Stamp – Willie Garvin
Dirk Bogarde – Gabriel
Harry Andrews – Sir Gerald Tarrant
Clive Revill – McWhirter / Sheikh Abu Tahir
Rosella Falk- Mes Fothergill
Michael Craig – Paul Hagan
Tina Aumont – Nicole

Joseph Losey? Dirk Bogarde? Harold Pinter? Then add Monica Vitti, known for her work with Antonioni? That sounds serious stuff. In fact, Antonioni came along to watch Vitti filming, and started whispering direction to her, so that Losey had to bar him from the set. Terence Stamp chose this part over the lead role in Alfie, his mistake, Michael Caine’s gain.

Modesty Blaise had been a terrible flop …
Terence stamp, interview for the ‘Poor Cow’ DVD extras.

It may have been a flop, but he stuck with producer Joseph Janni which led to success with Far From The Madding Crowd and Poor Cow.

The DVD sleeve claims:

Joseph Losey directs this psychedelic adventure straight from the swinging sixties, where the jokes come thick and fast, the violence is outlandish and the action never stops.

Well, 1966 in the UK is rather earlier for ‘psychedelic’ to be bandied about. Like Barbarella, this is based on a cartoon strip, Modesty Blaise, which started in the Evening Standard in 1963. Modesty is a female James Bond, and the film’s broader successors many years down the line are Austin Powers and Johnny English, though both those starred flat out comedians. I never thought James Bond needed much sending up, being over the top in the first place. There must be some relation to The Avengers TV series (1961-69) where first Honor Blackman then Diana Rigg played cool heroines well-versed in martial arts.

Modesty Blaise was based on a Greek refugee who Peter O’Donnell had met in the army. and he established a considerable back story to take her to the British Secret Service.

Modesty is the master of every occasion, knows many languages, can find her way in any culture, can best any man in combat (her favourite weapon is the ‘kongo’ or yawara stick, a small wooden stick held in the palm of the hand) and is also extremely attractive. Unlike Bond however, she does not have constant sexual adventures (a trait she shares with some other notable action heropines, including Emma Peel from The Avengers television programmes).
Comics Through Time, ed. M. Keith Booker. 2014

Modesty Blaise, cartoon strip

The illustration style seems to have inspired the Letraset press-down illustrations we used in home-grown ELT material in the 70s. The strip and character survived its campy and less than successful film treatment. The strip lasted till 2001 (in 10,183 instalments), and spawned collections and graphic novels. Peter O’Donell wrote eleven Modesty Blaise novels and two collections of stories going on till 1996. The first, Modesty Blaise, was a novelization of his original movie script. There were two later film attempts.

The film went a long way from Peter O’Donnel’s intentions. He said he only had one surviving line in the script, What do you know about Wilberforce? Most importantly, in the strip Blaise and her sidekick Willie, NEVER have a romantic relationship. In the film they do.

They carefully insert Modesty Blaise prints as decoration in the film. Throughout it’s worth keeping an eye out for subtleties in the background … a large Kama Sutra in Modesty’s apartment, or a sign with VERBOTEN TE ROKEN in the airport control tower, with the three men standing around it, one with cigarette, one with pipe and one with cigar.

I have never been a fan of James Bond films. I know I saw this, but remembered little about it, and it’s the third Terence Stamp film in quick succession. He was certainly eclectic – no typecasting in any of the roles.

There’s a theory that comedians do better at straight acting, than conventional actors do at comedy. I’ve seen Lenny Henry, Rowan Atkinson Rik Mayall and many others who started in comedy on stage and they’d bear out the theory. This film with Terence Stamp, Dirk Bogarde and Monica Vitti apparently playing for comedy but not being funny, also bears it out. Terence Stamp has added that Joseph Losey “had no sense of humour” which is a disadvantage when doing comedy.

The best bits are the set design and costumes … Monica Vitti as Modesty Blaise

Monica Vitti was extraordinarily beautiful. She gets an extraordinary number of hair colours and styles to match., which added to my general difficulty in working out the story.

Terence Stamp was oddly lacking in sexual chemistry … an almost asexual quality which was used to good purpose in Theorem. 

Dirk Bogarde as arch-criminal mastermind Gabriel

Gabriel- cocktail with goldfish, McWhirter seated

Dirk Bogarde was OTT. Bogarde has a line “He suffers quite frightfully from cramp.” It should be a self reference and read ‘camp’ not ‘cramp.’ If you have to act with an outsize wine glass containing purple liquid with a goldfish swimming in it, it’s hard not to be camp. The silver wig doesn’t help. The character is called Gabriel. It was one of our name choices for kids until a friend pointed out ‘Gay’ was the short version.

The Gabriel entourage. Dirk Bogarde left in wig.

However, Bogarde is SO over the top, surrounded by gorgeous young men with bare chests, or tight white shorts, that he is the best thing in it. There is a fabulous shot with his shirt being blown by the wind. Pity they didn’t use the angle for Modesty’s blouse.

Mrs Fothergill, is as a more recent review says, ‘his beard,’ and she supervises men doing press ups and odd bits of torture.

A shaky Sheikh (Clive Rehill) with cannon in his apartment, sons behind.

Clive Rehill plays two roles … McWhirter and the Sheikh. This is unusual, but as he is so heavily done up as a stereotype (racist?) Arab sheikh with a prosthetic nose, that he is not recognizable. There’s a weird meeting in his apartment with lots of sons in toppers and tails surrounding a Vespa scooter.

Clive Rehill as McWhirter with nose protector … note pens in pocket.

Later, when he’s McWhirter, Gabriel’s sidekick, he suddenly has a large nose protection plaster in view. Was this susceptibility to sunburn? Damage when the prosthetic nose was put on and off? Or a sign that he was a nerd? It wasn’t on there in earlier or later scenes.

Ah, 60s cliches … a mad friar playing a church organ? Essential, obviously.

WARNING: This film may contain mimes in white face.

Then there’s the mime in white face. He ends up being tossed over a cliff (best thing for a mime in white face, really), and the dummy they toss over wouldn’t make it on a ten year old’s Guy Fawkes cart because it looks too fake.

The story is convoluted and uninvolving and I lost the plot or rather lost interest in the storyline. I’ve said this in the theatre reviews sometimes, but the best bit was costumes and set design with a mid-60s feel. There was one good SFX where an Amsterdam canal house blows up, leaving a gap in the row.

An impressive SFX for 1966

PLOT  

Sir Gerald Tarrant (Harry Andrews) is head of the Secret Service. He recruits Modesty Blaise (Monica Vitti), whois an expert art thief, to protect a shipment of diamonds going to a Middle Eastern sheik, Abu Tahir (Clive Rehill). Gabriel ((Dirk Bogarde) is head of a criminal organization with McWhirter (also played by Clive Revill) and Mrs. Fothergill  (Rosella Falk). Modesty believes that Gabriel is dead, but he reveals himself to her. They’ve known each other since 1958.

(Im)modesty. Didn’t her mother tell her not to sit like that?

In Amsterdam, Modesty reunites with her former lover, secret agent Paul Hagen (Michael Craig) while her partner, Willie Garvin (Terence Stamp) is reunited with an old flame, Nicole ((Tina Aumont). Nicole is killed by assassins working for Gabriel, who are in turn killed by Modesty and Willie. Modesty and Willie  want to draw Gabriel out, but  are  pursued by Tarrant and Hagen.

Boxes purportedly containing the diamonds are sent by plane … a military Hawker Hunter … as a decoy. Gabriel’s listening in to the cockpit conversation as they fly over the Alps. The dialogue? Well:

Pilot 1: Do you ski?
Pilot 2: No. Do you?
Pilot 1: No

They’re about to shoot the plane down, and poor Gabriel gets quite sentimental:

Gabriel; The pilot’s got a charming voice. Thirty five? Would you say …?
McWhirter:  I very much fear he’s married …
Gabriel: I was afraid of that.

It breaks his heart when the pilots move from Do you ski? to Do you skate?  and the one he facies sweetly describes his parents taking him tobogganing. Never mind, Gabriel shoots it down with a million pounds worth of missile. But really the diamonds are travelling by sea. Sir Gerald was expecting it to be shot down. No worries about the pilots. Gabriel states that only two people are good enough to crack the safe with the diamonds, himself and Willie Garvin. He needs Willie (NO!)

Modesty (Monica Vitti) and Willie (Terence Stamp)

Modesty and Willie are now in the air, with Willie piloting, and doing his best Mockney: I figure it vis way, Princess … / We ain’t arf bin through some scrapes together …  They arrive in the Med, and stop for a duet, regretting that they never hit (or rather, had) it off. They burst into song (I was almost expecting For we’re a couple of swells …):

We could’ve, we should’ve
Perhaps we can.

Terence Stamp sang in this, and in Poor Cow and Far From The Madding Crowd.

They set off in an open top Ferrari only to be pursued by a beautiful huge Cadillac and a classic Citroen DS … all great cars, it’s the set, costumes and props again.  The chase music is incongruously Les Swingle Singers (or the like). They’re stopped and captured by Sir Gerald and his men. In true Bond / Le Carre fashion, the Secret Service chiefs are villains in their own way.

Sir Gerald: How the devil did you get a passport, Garvin?
Willie: Just because I’m working class …
Sir Gerald: Lower class, surely …

It’s only a pack of Gauloise …

In a nice tribute to daft Bond gadgetry, they each take a pack of Gauloises cigarettes into their captor’s cars, which turns into a colourful drugged smoke bomb, and they have smoke hoods and escape. Then they’re drunk in a rainstorm (I have no idea why) shouting, her for Gabb-ree-al, which he corrects to Gay – bree-al. . They go “home to bed.” In the morning Gabriel calls from his boat and invites her for breakfast. She goes dressed up as a wedding cake (well, nearly). She switches blonde to dark hair instantly when he says he prefers her dark. Mrs Forthergill hits her over the head from behind … Modesty wakes up in a ship’s hold, inexplicably back to blonde during her sleep. Willie has been captured. Gabriel says the ship has a cargo of fruit and nuts:

Willie: He’s a fruit merchant, see.

No, the references to Gabriel’s sexuality are neither subtle nor are they far apart.

L to R: Mrs Fothergill (Rosella Falk), Gabriel, Willie Garvin, Modesty. Captured!

They search Modesty for other Bond gadgets … she is naked of course. Mrs Fothergill appears to take an unusual interest in her upper leg.  The Tyberia, the ship with the diamonds arrives. So Gabriel  forces Willie to help steal the diamonds. They have a midget submarine and Willie has to put on a frogman outfit. Modesty gets out of captivity by luring the organ-playing Friar who assumes she’s naked. She’s not.

This way, Friar …

Gabriel and Modesty watch and listen from his ship. The Brits are watching too, as usual swigging Pimms continually.

Modesty and Willie escape from Gabriel’s Mediterranean island, killing Mrs. Fothergill with a rope and bucket (Kick the bucket … they say of course). Willie had a skin colour elastoplast gadget back pack that no one had noticed.

Abu Tahir’s forces invade the island by rubber dinghy, a mini moke and horses and capture Gabriel. While Gabriel is fleeing he casts off his silver wig to reveal his own dark hair. I guess changing hair is a running joke with Modesty so add to it.

Modesty (left), Abu Tahir and Gabriel. And camels.

We go to the desert where the Arabs are pumping oil … done by women in full burqhas. Gabriel is stretched out on the sand for the ants, Willie Garvin is bathing in a goats milk shower, and Modesty is dressed up in (male) Arab clothing. Abu Tahir addresses her as ‘my son …‘  (WTF?) Modesty gives the shipment of diamonds to Abu Tahir and, as her reward, receives the diamonds.

DVD TRANSFER

Excellent with sharp colour.

SOUNDTRACK

John Dankworth. The LP is collectible.

The Modesty Blaise Theme by Johnny Dankworth was a UK single release, but then David and Jonathan’s vocal theme Modesty was released in the USA, but not in the UK. David & Jonathan were songwriters Roger Greenaway & Roger Cook. They had two decent hits in 1966 with Michelle and Lovers Of The World Unite. Maybe release of this would have interfered.

CRITICS

… the set design work which, whilst mediocre for much of the film’s length, occasionally breaks into surrealist brilliance … and when you’re watching a film for the wallpaper you know you’re in trouble. On the minus side, the incoherent structure and atrocious dialogue are accompanied by a wacky racist depiction of Modesty’s Arab allies, who are treated like cartoon figures, and the beaurocrats in the British government are similarly twee. There’s a collection of the sort of gadgets one can imagine Q designing when he was five, and poor direction means we rarely get a satisfying look at them.
Jennie Kermode, Eye for Film.2012, *

DIRK BOGARDE

Darling (1965)
Modesty Blaise (1966)
Accident (1967)

THE 60s REVISITED REVIEWS …

A Taste of Honey (1961)
Sparrows Can’t Sing (1963)
Tom Jones (1963)
The Fast Lady (1963)
Cat Ballou (1965)
The Ipcress File (1965)
Darling (1965)
The Knack (1965)
Doctor Zhivago (1965)
Morgan – A Suitable Case For Treatment (1966)
Alfie (1966)
Harper (aka The Moving Target) 1966
The Chase (1966)
The Trap (1966)
Georgy Girl (1966)
Fahrenheit 451 (1966)
Modesty Blaise (1966)
The Family Way (1967)
Privilege (1967)
Blow-up (1967)
Accident (1967)
Bonnie and Clyde (1967)
I’ll Never Forget What’s ‘Is Name (1967)
How I Won The War (1967)
Far From The Madding Crowd (1967)
Poor Cow (1967)
Here We Go Round The Mulberry Bush (1968)
The Magus (1968)
If …. (1968)
The Devil Rides Out (aka The Devil’s Bride) (1968)
Work Is A Four Letter Word (1968)
The Party (1968)
Petulia (1968)
Barbarella (1968)
The Thomas Crown Affair (1968)
Bullitt (1968)
Deadfall (1968)
The Swimmer (1968)
Theorem (Teorema) (1968)
The Magic Christian (1969)
The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer (1970)
Performance (1970)