Jason Love (continued)

Films Spies, Spoofs & Spinoffs
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I began this thread on the archived forum.
You can catch all the older details here:
Jason Love - Spies, Spoofs & Spin-offs - CBn Forums (commanderbond.net)

My recent follow-up post.
If I ever get to see the full movie of WHERE THE SPIES ARE, I’ll add something on.

LOVE AND THE LAND BEYOND (1979)

When I read the James Leasor’s Jason Love case-histories back in 2014, I couldn’t track down a paperback copy of the good Doctor’s 1979 adventure LOVE AND THE LAND BEYOND. It transpires this novel never had a paperback publication. I can only assume this was due to poor hardback sales. However, jump forward five years and the James Leasor Estate has taken the action of reissuing through private publication all of the Jason Love novels (and some others of the author’s work) which has allowed me to purchase a nice, clean, fresh soft cover edition of my missing edition.

Was it worth the extra wait? Well, yes and no. I had a brief look back at the reviews I wrote when originally dissecting these thrillers and was surprised how much I praised them. My memory of them now is that they were rather staid affairs and suffered from a formulaic approach and unimaginative writing. I praised some of the plots, remarked on the suspense and tension and even noted the dry humour. I had a soft spot for the genial country doctor who kept getting into scrapes and scraps and used his military training, his karate expertise and his ingenuity to rescue him from various life-threatening situations. I did retain some reservations. People pop up in hotel rooms far too easily. There is a tremendous amount of gin drinking. I don’t get the fascination with Cord cars, which must have seemed odd in the sixties but is positively alien fifty years on. Some of the plot ingredients were head-scratchingly obscure. I disliked the character of Parkington, a roaming special agent who kept appearing at opportune moments, but who, being as good as an invalid, was spectacularly useless. I also disliked the fact all the stories bar one occurred fortuitously. Only in his debut, PASSPORT TO OBLIVION, was Dr Love dispatched on a mission by MI6. Every other time he happened to stumble across the villain’s plan at the precise moment MI6 became involved. This was repetitive and made little sense. It also became annoying that, while Dr Love resolved the immediate problems he faced, his sometime boss McGillivray, would sit in his London office and quietly join all the dots of these escapades, which often spread across the globe. This usually resulted in a coda of extreme tedium where he had to explain how all the disparate elements slotted neatly beside each other.

It all happens again in LOVE AND THE LAND BEYOND. There’s not a lot wrong with the writing. For most of the novel’s 200+ pages, it’s on point. Leasor does the action right enough and there’s a smattering of intrigue and some moments of taut, well expounded tension. The novels starts with the cruel, mysterious murder of a British tourist in the Algarve and plunges Jason Love into a stand- off between rival smugglers all competing for a secret magic formula contained in a sealed metal container on board a rusty old steam ship. The novel is easy to read, swift and has enough juicy goings-on not to disappoint. So why did I feel so let down?

I can only assume it’s because the author has stuck so rigidly to his formula, one he hit on for PASSPORT TO PERIL and has not relinquished. Everything I disliked is obvious and prominent. Everything I do like is still there too, but I struggled to get past the recurring features of Leasor’s [Love’s] adventures. This is book by solid numbers.

It had been a while since Jason Love’s last foray into print – the fast paced Aristo Autos opus HOST OF EXTRAS – and Leasor doesn’t even bother to note the passing. He does suggest Parkington has registered as an alcoholic, although this doesn’t stop him drinking a ton of gin. McGillivray is older, greyer and still dreams of country cottages. That’s about it for character development. Having caught a few clips on You Tube etc of the movie WHERE THE SPIES ARE – I can’t seem to track down the whole film – which starred David Niven as Jason Love – I now couldn’t get the debonair actor of him out of my head when reading the novel. In fact, given the doctor’s handy ability to pass off each event with a droll quip, to meet each individual with a generous handshake and a genial manner, to stay suave under pressure, stay besuited and chic, and to drink so much gin, I rather fancy Leasor actually started to model his hero on Mr Niven.

Perhaps the worst offense and the reason for the book’s lack of success is the dreadful title. It is explained in a short descriptive paragraph. The action is set on the Playa du Luz in Portugal, near the western-most tip of Europe. The locals refer to the sea here as ‘The Land Beyond.’ This is way too ambiguous for a book title. It might work for science fiction, but for a thriller, it doesn’t conjure anything remotely exciting. Inserting ‘Love And…’ before the phrase simply makes the adventure sound as if it’s escaped from the canon of Mills and Boon. ‘Passport to Lisbon’ might have been better, even if it’s geographically incorrect, or ‘Love and Death,’ perhaps.

I was pleased to complete my collection. Jason Love’s adventures are certainly better than most spy stories of the sixties and seventies, yet their repetitive nature is a recurring disappointment. As the novels progressed it becomes a barrier to enjoyment. This novel is probably the start of a steep slippery slope [my reviews of the final two adventures in the series were resoundingly negative] and, while I won’t damage Mr Leasor’s reputation by suggesting he’s a poor writer – he isn’t – I can’t say he’s an inventive one and the approach he provided for the Love novels hampers his style and my enjoyment.

A thumbs up, overall then for Jason Love, but this particular novel is a bit so-so.

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Glad to see you back on the job, @chrisno1 - thanks for sharing your insights into Jason Love and these other series you tracked down.

I initially thought you’ve been a bit hard on Modesty Blaise, but after rereading some of her adventures recently I have to concede they didn’t age as well in reality as in my fond memories…

May I point you to Johnny Fedora? I’d be really interested to learn what you make of them, particularly versus other 60s spy adventures.

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After many years of trying, I finally tracked down Jason Love’s one and only cinematic adventure, so here for your pleasure:

WHERE THE SPIES ARE

Colombia: 1966

Director Val Guest
Screenplay Val Guest, Wolf Mankiewicz

Starring: David Niven, Francoise Dorleac, John le Mesurier, Nigel Davenport, Paul Stassino, Robert Rudd, Cyril Cusack

Following the huge stateside success of Goldfinger and the excitement about all things spy as the Bond-craze took off, film makers were looking for material they could adapt into light-hearted espionage movies. The most obvious of these are Len Deighton’s The Ipcress File, Donald Hamilton’s The Silencers and Peter O’Donnell’s Modesty Blaise. There were others too, including The Man from UNCLE television show, and more serious fare such as Le Carre’s The Spy Who Came In From The Cold.

A literary series still in its foundling stage in 1964 was Jason Love, written by James Leasor, whose first novel became Passport to Oblivion. Leasor was not an unknown writer, but astutely following Eon’s lead, he saw an opportunity to enter the espionage market and create an urbane hero, whose adventures were globetrotting, suspenseful and cinematically appealing. The first Jason Love novel was a well described actioner taking place in Iran and Canada, featuring intrigue, gadgets, fights, gun battles and torture. It was well reviewed and sold decent copy, appealing to various movie executives before directors / producers / screenwriters Val Guest and Wolf Mankiewicz got their hands on it. Their intention wasn’t to spoof James Bond or create an imitation of him, but make a faithful representation of Leasor’s novel and his hero.

It is worth noting that while the movie does feature some tropes of the kind we are familiar with from OO7, these, as well as some less expected images do in the majority feature in Leasor’s own writings: there are gadgets, passwords, contacts and double-crosses, Jason Love is a novice spy, a gentleman lover and a man who shuns violence and the tricks of his adopted trade. The film stays remarkably close to the narrative of the novel and is much the better for it.

Iran was considered unreliable for filming in the sixties, so the action is supplanted to Beirut, which still has a suitably sleazy middle-eastern air to it. The movie begins in a Soviet briefing centre where an MI6 defector explains the gadgets MI6 agents are issued with, including poison pens, flash-light rings and code books. We meet Rosser, who in the novel is the unnamed agent K. Played by Cyril Cusack, Rosser / K is a older, slightly nervy man, who remains calm under pressure. After sending a telegram, he’s kidnapped by two enemy agents in the lobby of his hotel, taken to the Roman ruins at Baalbek where he attempts to escape using the flash-light ring. This is a neat gadget which has a smidgeon of authenticity to it. Rosser is shot, although his superiors in London don’t know that. Missing his last communication, they simply think he’s gone off grid and decide to send an agent to Lebanon to contact him.

Times are hard at this version of MI6. John Le Mesurier plays MacGillivray, the ‘M’ of the story, and he’s a frustrated, diffident, civil servant, cutting a solid, traditional look in pinstripes and waist coats. Le Mesurier usually only had small supporting roles in this kind of film, but he’s very prominent here, central to Jason Love’s recruitment and explaining the background of the mission. He has a neat turn of phrase as well. At one point Jason Love suggests he’s not cut out to be ‘Superman,’ “Just as well,” replies MacGillivray without a pause, “that sort of exhibitionism tends to get you killed.”

Jason Love, as epitomised by David Niven, carries a similar air of insouciance. He’s persuaded to undertake the simple task on the promise the Service can find him a rare 1930s Cord motor car. Love may be a country doctor, but he’s also an expert on Cord automobiles, which he considers the finest cars ever made. He drives one, the last of its kind, and later on his knowledge and enthusiasm helps him identify the men who assassinated K. He’s not a great spy, although his military training helps. He’s very disdainful of the briefcase of tricks, the poison pen and the tiny radioactive transmitter inserted into his tooth which, when activated by removal will disrupt any localised electronic equipment. This last eventually comes in handy at the film’s climax, but I did wonder about the health of poor Dr Love’s teeth.

David Niven is a touch too old to play this sort of hero. I rather fancy Omar Sharif might have graced it better. Nevertheless, Niven contributes all the attributes one would expect. He’s good looking, suave, easy on the eye and tongue and ear, he’s more than competent. The performance is very similar to the one he gave in The Pink Panther as Sir Charles Lytton, a role not a million miles away in its foundation. He takes the material seriously when needed, despatches villains effectively and has the charm to seduce Francoise Dorleac’s beautiful double-agent. He’s able to slum it too, accompanying Nigel Davenport’s hard drinking Parkington to the Shahnwa nightclub. Davenport’s good as the permanently jaundiced alcoholic. A cynic and a bull, Parkington prefers to shoot first and this results in him, well, getting shot.

There’s a clear class barrier established here. MacGillivray represents the upper classes, pushing pens and people around the world, like pins on a map, almost without a care. Jason Love is the middle class aspirational, swayed by a little comfort, easily pleased, willing, able, but not especially sensible. Parkington is the hard working, poor-man’s alternative, stuck in a job he fell into, under pressure and failing. This man can’t even best Dr Love in a fight. Dorleac’s Vikki, being French, displays a modern classless grace.

A magazine model and seductress, she meets Love at Rome Airport during his stopover – although it isn’t clear why this should be – and the two share a lovely, witty, believable seduction scene, where Love’s, or Niven’s if you will, gentlemanly behaviour stops the intense amor. When he decides against making love to Vikki, Jason Love mutters: “The things I do for England.” This predates Sean Connery’s line in You Only Live Twice where he deliberately continues his seduction of an enemy agent. The behavioural difference and the pathos is marked, establishing Jason Love as a non-Bond impersonation. Naturally though, this endears him to Vikki. Love also senses the attraction. At the airport, he rebooks his flight to Beirut and then watches as the original plane explodes in a ball of fire. The ringing telephone, unanswered in Vikki’s room speaks volumes for their sudden unrequited affections. Scenes like this are rare in the sixties spy genre and should be lauded. One thing Where the Spies Are does well is to stay grounded.

There’s an assassination afoot. King Faroud is visiting Beirut. The ruler of an unnamed Arab state, Faroud’s oil is vital to commercial British enterprises and the Soviets plan to destabilise his country, throwing the British out. This strand of the plot hints at old colonial prejudices, that the world is changing and the British are being left behind. When Vikki tells Love she’s betrayed him, he looks stupefied, she has to explain that the world is changing, that spies and spying is a business for professionals. Britain’s club of amateur ruling classes is fading as fast as a Cord motor car. Jason Love still has enough affection for his own Mother Country to continue on in Beirut and prevent the murder Rosser / K had uncovered. The JFK inspired public assassination sequence is the closest we get to the silliness of the spy spoof as Niven runs blindly around a Roman fortress, knocking out gunmen, interfering in Vikki’s model shoot and escaping with the aid of a fortuitously arriving helicopter.

The film loses its way a bit once Love is captured by the Russians, who have covertly arrived on a Aeroflot Peace Plane. The enemy agents include the convincing Paul Stassino as Dr Simmias. Himself facing execution for incompetence, Simmias defects and reveals the whereabouts of Dr Love to the British. This is another believable incident, lowkey and presented with thorough and quick exposition. There’s no extensive fights or chases here. Instead Love is tortured by Ronald Radd’s Stanilaus, forces the Peace Plane to land in Canada by using the ingenious transmitter and makes good an exit following a fatal gun battle which ends Vikki’s life and finishes off the bad guys.

The closing scenes don’t quite match what came before. There’s a neat joke where Love states the new MI6 code book is the Kama Sutra, precisely because the book is banned in Russia, but otherwise this sequence is deadly serious, yet oddly tensionless, perhaps because there’s no real point to this exercise, as there wasn’t in the novel. Hence, the story drags at the moment it ought to thrill.

On the production side, Guest and Mankiewicz’s script proves functional. Leasor himself added some gloss. Val Guest’s direction sums up his career as it’s competent without ever being extravagant. He’s probably at his best in the opening sequence where Rosser is uncovered and kidnapped. There are real surprises here and a cloying atmosphere of Cold War anxieties and manners pervades the action. The location footage is all exteriors, but the interiors don’t disgrace anyone, although it is noticeable how large and uncluttered Ken Adam’s OO7 sets are – even the small ones – compared to those created here by John Howell. Adam gives his sets enormous scope and space and more than anything this gave Bond films an impression of size and grandeur. By contrast, Where the Spies Are and Jason Love can’t help looking a tad undercooked. The music from Mario Nasimbene has a mid-sixties Mantovani lounge feel, which doesn’t sound as rough on the ear as it reads on paper, even if occasionally there’s some extravagance with the strings. Robert Brownjohn filmed the rather excellent title sequence. I do wish he’d done more Bond titles.

Where the Spies Are is a much better film than it’s given credit for. Chief among its assets is treating its subject with an element of seriousness. Yes, it’s funny. Yes, it is a little silly. But there’s no outrageous plot, no enormous grandstanding set, no over the top henchmen with steel rimmed bowler hats, no secret operatives with white cats and fancy names. Okay, I’m being unfair to James Bond now, but by not slavishly following the unwritten rules the industry created for spy-spoofs following Goldfinger, Where the Spies Are succeeds to rise above the general malaise.

If you want to view it, I watched it on this link. It took me ages to find it, I’m not sure why, as it has been posted since 2018:

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