It was released as "The Man with the Camera"in Japan with Sean in a full gunbarrel pose with a newsreel camera.
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I remember seeing that poster somewhere , I thought Connery was excellent in it.
That was superb - i love Dante!
And that is some cast! Rob Conrad and cult fave John Saxon could both have played Bond (if they had US). Saxon did a great early 70s sardonic Bond routine for Enter The Dragon. Be interesting to see how their screen presence stands up to Connery
Then there’s the great Dean Stockwell and Ron Moody; i’m not particularly into musicals, but Moody’s Fagin is one of my all time favourite performances. Would’ve made an amazing Bond villain.
Perusing IMDB there’s support from Hardy Kruger, Robert Webber, Leslie Nielson, Jack Palance-alike Henry Silva and even a young Jennifer Jason-Leigh.
What a lost gem of a movie - looking forward to it.
And a fantastic cameo from Katherine Ross, Nielson is particularly good . I hope you enjoy it !
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Personally I thought the movie was an incompetent muddle, just the kind of schlock that threatened to push Connery into has-been territory had he not signed on for NSNA and given his career a second wind. Not that NSNA was much better, but it put Connery back in the media spotlight again and led to greater things.
Sean and his mate Michael Caine are both fascinating to me in that they could participate in such thoroughly awful films and then turn right around and do a fantastic one next. You could set up a Caine or Connery movie marathon of 6 to 8 films each and, depending on the titles chosen, come away thinking they were either the most amazing movie stars of the late 20th century, or the least discriminating “take the money and run” cash grab artists of all time. Maybe that’s true of most actors now, or anyway since the end of the studio system, but when I was younger the phenomenon seemed most striking with those two. And for my money, Connery’s hit-to-miss ratio was on a downward trend by the early 80s.
Unfortunately, Sir Roger’s non-Bond career was far more lopsided. He never did manage to balance out the stinkers with gems.
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It was and is really a matter of which offers are made.
Caine never made a fuss about his choice of roles, and really, why should he? The A-C-T-O-R-S who only pursue the most I-M-P-O-R-T-A-N-T parts are either content with starving for their art or they already have made enough money so they can afford to be extremely choosy.
Most actors, however, just need to work, especially if they don’t want to retire too early and need to keep paying their bills on a constant basis. Also, typecasting is what really limits actors to get only one particular kind of offers. Caine just said: okay, you want me to be that guy right now I will do that. (His wonderful quote about JAWS-THE REVENGE was a perfect summary of his view, and I sympathize.)
Connery wanted to get the meaty roles to show that he is not just Bond - but when those efforts did not yield awards and attention he had to take what was offered to an aging former leading actor - hence films with interesting concepts but less wonderful execution. Only when he aged into the old mentor-sector he lucked out with THE UNTOUCHABLES and could ride out that part of his career as the legendary movie star he was (and is!).
Moore was like Caine pre-Bond and did whatever he thought he could handle. Between the Bond films he had some successful ventures, some flops, mostly when he strayed too far from the wise-cracking hero-model (check out his character turn in NORTH SEE HIJACK, which is a highly entertaining film with him playing a very different character). After Bond Moore just did not seem to be as interested in another career stage, and why should he have? He had enough money and could focus on more important things than the silly movie business.
Brosnan went the same way as Caine, I would say.
And I am curious whether Craig will finally do that, too. His choice of film roles between the Bonds would suggest that.
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Yes, I always loved that when Caine won the Oscar for “Hannah and Her Sisters,” he had to accept by satellite because he was in the Bahamas filming “Jaws: The Revenge.” To me, that poked a wonderful hole in the pretentious BS that is the Academy Awards, reminding us that at the end of the day, acting is just a job like any other, and Priority 1 is putting food on the table.
I seem to remember reading that Caine took the “Jaws” gig because it beat paying for a trip to the Bahamas on his own nickel. 
I wouldn’t say a lot of Connery’s films merely failed to win awards and attention: many of them were just flat out bad. Obviously he’d have cared about awards and keeping the career momentum going: I would’ve been happy just to have good films to watch, even if nobody got rich off them. For instance, I don’t think “Robin and Marian” was a box-office smash, but I loved it. On the other hand, sitting through something like “The Terrorists,” “The Next Man,” “Cuba” or “Meteor” is something I could’ve gladly done without. And even “success” doesn’t mean a lot to me as a viewer: for instance I’m probably in the minority in thinking “The Rock” is awful, even if did rake in the bucks (possibly because it tiptoed as closely as possible to just coming right out and saying his character is “Old Man Bond”).
I’d compare Brosnan more to Roger: a couple of good entries between Bonds, but nothing great post-Bond. I haven’t seen him in that Western TV series, though. Maybe that has some merit.
Craig will probably end up like Connery for me: more interesting outside of Bond. I like “Layer Cake,” “Defiance” and even “Logan Lucky” better than 3/4ths of Craig’s Bond films, and as fun as Sean is in the 007 role, I like him much better in “The Man Who Would Be King,” “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade” and on some days even “Finding Forrester.”
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Difference is that Connery started Bond young, so he could afford the well over a decade in the doldrums before getting recognition and status independent of Bond (although The Man Who Would Be King is one of my favourite movies). Doing NSNA obviously didn’t help that cause.
By that token Craig is almost a decade behind Connery, so he doesn’t have the luxury of time to shake off Bond. However, his Bond movies have been given more critical acclaim than his predecessors so he doesn’t have as much ‘shaking’ to do. Even so, i don’t think he’ll find that easy.
Brossa did one really great movie after Bond; The Matador 2005.
Well, at least Craig can’t use Connery’s excuse of having no time between Bonds to make his mark. If they spaced out Craig’s films any further, he could raise a family between each one.
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Yeah…what has Craig done whilst he was Bond? Just little things with nobodies like Jon Favreau, Rian Johnson, Steven Soderbergh and some dude called Spielberg?
Such a lazy so and so
He did less films in between than he could have. And really, apart from MUNICH there weren‘t very good movies in that batch. KNIVES OUT could be fun, but the rest was not.
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Craig also made THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO and appeared on the New York stage three times.
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I wasn’t criticizing Craig for not keeping busy, just noting that he’s had a LOT more time to pursue a “side career” whilst Bond than any of his predecessors did. Whenever I find myself fretting that the Bond films are too far apart now, I console myself with the fact that it does leave Craig time to do other things, most of which end up being better than his Bonds, anyway. I think he stands to leave Bond on more solid footing than any of his predecessors did, career-wise.
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Wrong is Right is a mess…but an interesting mess! It’s an uneasy fusion of conspiracy thriller and satire, dealing with still relevant topics: out-of-control news corporations, suicide bombing, spy satellites, oil-rich dictators in the middle east, a Presidential election involving a demagogic populist, CIA skulduggery, terrorism, and missing nukes. Connery is cast somewhat against type as a star TV reporter but seems to be enjoying himself quite a bit–what he does in his final scene is unforgettably hilarious.
The film gets my recommendation, especially if you’re a Connery fan, but don’t approach it with very high expectations. Wrong is Right is a confused dream of the future, a crazy mirror whose broken shards still catch the light after 36 years.
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Oh, yes - I remember! Which star would do something like that today?
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Not one
Getting back to the thread topic, just saw “Funeral In Berlin” and I have no idea what took me so long to get around to this gem. What a great film this is, rife with Cold War suspense, beautiful imagery and Michael Caine at the top of his game. I love that Harry Palmer is the anti-Bond, not just with the glasses and working-class mindset, but in his disdain for violence in general. When his boss orders him to liquidate the baddie and Harry, aghast, says, “I’m not killing anyone in cold blood!” I had to stop and think, “Wait, can the hero DO that in a spy movie?”
The East Berlin sequences are mesmerizing: all the mostly empty streets and bombed-out ruins left over from WWII. Did they really get clearance somehow to film there or were there just stretches of West Berlin still as damaged in the late 60s that could stand in?
Mostly I’m kicking myself for not discovering Eva Renzi until now: what a striking woman and charismatic presence. I was seriously depressed to find she’d passed away at just 60 years old.
Anyway, a very clever plot, terrific direction from our old pal Guy Hamilton and just generally two hours well spent.
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Also, there’s the bit where the gorgeous Eva Renzi takes Harry back to her flat for a one-night stand and the next day, Harry has her investigated, because he knows no beautiful woman in her right mind would’ve done that. LOL
Again, turning the Bond formula on its ear.
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