MURDERERS’ ROW (1966)
Matt Helm, agente muy especial (Spain)
Bien joué Matt Helm (France)
Matt Helm contra las asesinas (Mexico)
1966 USA
Direction: Henry Levin
Actors: Dean Martin, Ann-Margret, Karl Malden
The film begins with a shot of the United States Capitol being destroyed. It is actually a scale model being used in the demonstration of a heliobeam weapon in the headquarters of the Bureau of International Government and Order (“BIG O”). BIG O is a secret organization with the goal of world domination that previously appeared in The Silencers.
With the aid of a mole, BIG O conducts a worldwide assassination campaign against various secret agents working for ICE (Intelligence Counter Espionage). Matt Helm fakes his own death in preparation for investigating the scheme undetected.
Helm meets his boss, Mac, for a mission briefing. Helm is to track down the missing Dr. Solaris, who has developed the powerful heliobeam weapon, a device that uses the concentrated power of sunlight for mass destruction. Helm is told if he can not rescue Solaris he is to kill him, and if captured to kill himself, lest BIG O brainwash him.
Posing as a Chicago gangster named Jim Peters, an alias of “Lash” Petroni, Helm travels to the French Riviera to follow his only lead, Solaris’s daughter, Suzie. Concerned about her father’s disappearance, Suzie helps Matt infiltrate the island lair of the diabolical Julian Wall, blow it up, and thereby save Washington, D.C. from being destroyed.
Matt Helm is a fictional character created by author Donald Hamilton. He is a U.S. government counter-agent—a man whose primary job is to kill or nullify enemy agents—not a spy or secret agent in the ordinary sense of the term as used in spy thrillers.
The films used the name Matt Helm, his cover identity, plus book titles and some very loose plot elements, but otherwise the series bore no resemblance at all to the character, atmosphere, or themes of Hamilton’s original books, nor to the hard-edged action of Bond. One reason was the attitude of the filmmakers that the only way to compete with the Bond films was to parody them.
The Dean Martin version of Helm, created by screenwriter Saul, served as a significant inspiration for Mike Myers’s comic character Austin Powers and many references can be seen. Most significantly, both are fashion photographers as their cover jobs.
MURDERERS’ ROW (1966) FULL MOVIE
Music: Lalo Schifrin
Cinematography: Sam Leavitt
Edited by: Walter Thompson
Art Direction: Joseph C. Wright
Set Direction: George R. Nelson
Costume Design: Moss Mabry
Production companies:
- Columbia Pictures Corporation
- Meadway-Claude Productions Company
Running time: 105 minutes
