Billion Dollar Brain

The third and final entry in the 1960s spy film series starring Michael Caine as British MI-5 agent Harry Palmer brings the retired operative back into service after he's hired to deliver a sealed container from England to Helsinki and ends up entangled with: rogue American agent Leo Newbigen (Karl Malden), Col. Stok (Oskar Homolka)—a wily Soviet intelligence officer with a fondness for Harry—and General Midwinter (Ed Begley), a fanatical American oil tycoon who is plotting a conspiracy to destroy the Soviet empire. Where the first two movies eschewed James Bond–like gadgets and grandiosity for a less glamorous portrait of Cold War espionage, this 1967 production—drawn from the same-titled novel by Len Deighton—presents a flamboyant super-villain in Midwinter, a supercomputer that is the size of a football field (the Billion Dollar Brain of the title), and a small army launching a secret invasion. Director Ken Russell delivers a lively picture with a satirical edge, but sadly minus the spectacle or ingenuity of a Bond adventure (plus the globetrotting story is at odds with the more realistic sensibility of the source material). Françoise Dorléac (Catherine Deneuve's older sister, appearing in her last role before her tragic death in a car accident) costars as femme fatale Anya. Caine reprised the role of Harry Palmer in a pair of cable features in the 1990s, but this was the final theatrical work in the franchise. Previously released on DVD, Billion Dollar Brain has been remastered for DVD and its Blu-ray debut. Optional. (S. Axmaker)