Customer Reviews

The Cape Town Affair

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James Brolin ("The Amityville Horrow", Cheatin Hearts") and Jacqueline Bisset ("Wild Orchid", Anna Karenia") star in this masterpiece, dealing with communist secret endeavors in Cape Town, South Africa. Their main mission, is to recover an elusive envelope containing top secret microfilm.. Filled with espionage and romance, this film is one you will remember forever...

OK, It's really a live-action 1967 virtually note for note remake of Pickup on South Street, but James Brolin and Co. deliver a delightfully puppet-like remake of the Fuller classic. For some reason transported to an improbable South Africa, and yet simply steamrolls the 50's red scare plot, and seedy noir conventions over the new location. But the whole thing takes on the air of an episode of Thunderbirds meets James Bond and The Prisoner meets Sam Fuller, though it never quite lives up to the awesome such a blend would suggest. For devoted fans of the Fuller original, this is a hilarious campy romp. Too bad Criterion didn't include this as an extra on Pickup on South Street.

Take the plot of Pickup on South Street, fluff it up with sixties schlock, and what puffs forth is a colory, crime-does-pay piece that looks more like a Doris Day comedy than a caper flick. Imagine James Brolin in a role made memorable by Richard Widmark, and the picture's problem becomes even clearer. About the only shade left of noir here is the motivation of communist menace and the casting of Claire Trevor. Her presence is of little help to the effort, however, as she is blowzied out as an apparent ex-hooker in a role that makes a mockery of Thelma Ritter's previous portrayal of a dowdy, world-weary peddler. Even Brolin's waterfront shack looks like a fumigated, cleaned-by-mom clubhouse where, thanks to modern indulgence, nude pinups remain taped cutely cocky to the walls. Ho hum. If the movie was less than gaudy, it could be labeled film blanc.