"Carry On Spying" is more than just a "Carry On." Like the previous entry in the series starring Bernard Cribbins ("Carry On Jack"), "Spying" is a good spoof of a film genre in its own right.
"Jack" had upped the "Carry On" ante, with non-"Carry On" actors outnumbering the usual "Carry On" team. It was also the first of the great movie spoofs in the "Carry On" tradition.
"Spying" -- coming on the heels of "Jack" -- is among the best spy spoofs ever.
Kenneth Williams (using his "Hancock's Half Hour" snide voice throughout), Cribbins, Charles Hawtrey, and Barbara Windsor (in her first "Carry On") are inept agents sent out by "The Chief" (Eric Barker) to recover a formula.
Also among the good guys are Jim Dale, as a James Bond type character (looking remarkably like a young Timothy Dalton) who is always being thwarted by his own colleagues.
The sets are fantastic. There is the high-class restaurant where Williams and Cribbins are in black tie and Hawtry is in the clothes of a cycling racer. There's the "Vienna" set (actually a sound-stage at Pinewood) so reminiscent of "The Third Man" one almost expects to see Orson Welles lurking in the shadows (he isn't, worse luck). The have a cross-country train like that where so many espionage thrillers have taken place, and which gives one the feeling of constant, claustrophobic movement despite being stage-bound. They wonderfully capture the spirit of the Casbah in a scene with Eric Pohlmann, who was in several episodes of "Danger Man." And there are the space-age corridors of the underground hide-out of the bad guy, with the futuristic, slightly off-kilter oblong doors.
The timing of the film could not have been better. Made after "Dr. No" and contemporaneous with "From Russia With Love" (which also had an exciting train sequence), "Spying" came out just as James Bond was prepared to explode with "Goldfinger." Because of its black-and-white photography it really seems closer in spirit to the great television show "Danger Man" -- though the Vienna scenes could have been cut out of "The Third Man." It's hard to believe Michael Caine's "Harry Palmer" movies were released after "Carry On Spying."
"Carry On" movies were always at their best with spoofs of specific movie genres. "Carry On Spying" is one of the better entries in the series and can stand on its own as a remarkable spoof of espionage thrillers. Anyone who knows their espionage noir, or loves the "Carry On" spoofs, will dig this flick.
"Jack" had upped the "Carry On" ante, with non-"Carry On" actors outnumbering the usual "Carry On" team. It was also the first of the great movie spoofs in the "Carry On" tradition.
"Spying" -- coming on the heels of "Jack" -- is among the best spy spoofs ever.
Kenneth Williams (using his "Hancock's Half Hour" snide voice throughout), Cribbins, Charles Hawtrey, and Barbara Windsor (in her first "Carry On") are inept agents sent out by "The Chief" (Eric Barker) to recover a formula.
Also among the good guys are Jim Dale, as a James Bond type character (looking remarkably like a young Timothy Dalton) who is always being thwarted by his own colleagues.
The sets are fantastic. There is the high-class restaurant where Williams and Cribbins are in black tie and Hawtry is in the clothes of a cycling racer. There's the "Vienna" set (actually a sound-stage at Pinewood) so reminiscent of "The Third Man" one almost expects to see Orson Welles lurking in the shadows (he isn't, worse luck). The have a cross-country train like that where so many espionage thrillers have taken place, and which gives one the feeling of constant, claustrophobic movement despite being stage-bound. They wonderfully capture the spirit of the Casbah in a scene with Eric Pohlmann, who was in several episodes of "Danger Man." And there are the space-age corridors of the underground hide-out of the bad guy, with the futuristic, slightly off-kilter oblong doors.
The timing of the film could not have been better. Made after "Dr. No" and contemporaneous with "From Russia With Love" (which also had an exciting train sequence), "Spying" came out just as James Bond was prepared to explode with "Goldfinger." Because of its black-and-white photography it really seems closer in spirit to the great television show "Danger Man" -- though the Vienna scenes could have been cut out of "The Third Man." It's hard to believe Michael Caine's "Harry Palmer" movies were released after "Carry On Spying."
"Carry On" movies were always at their best with spoofs of specific movie genres. "Carry On Spying" is one of the better entries in the series and can stand on its own as a remarkable spoof of espionage thrillers. Anyone who knows their espionage noir, or loves the "Carry On" spoofs, will dig this flick.