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As Good As It Gets

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

The acting in this movie is really good.

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

I recorded this years ago on the UK TV during a "Dirk Bogarde Double Bill" together with the "Blue Lamp". Whilst the latter has since been issued on DVD ( Many of Bogarde's films fortunately have been ), someone, somewhere has forgotten this one. As it is so entertaining and colourful, I just cannot understand why. This is exactly the sort of film you need on a rainy miserable Sunday Afternoon to cheer you up. It blends Light Comedy, Fairly Exotic Sets, Sexy Ladies, Across-The-Iron-Curtain spy capers and features among others the great RObert Morley ( always irresistible ) and Leo McKern. The plot is original and unexpected. There is a fair amount of suspense and memorable scenes. My copy is getting slightly worn out and I should dearly like to find it on DVD. The UK is probably the only place it will be issued if ever. The title refers to the password that Bogarde must use to make contact with a spy in a Czekoslovak glass factory.

"Hot Enough For June" tries to be both a James Bond spoof AND a serious spy thriller, but in truth it contains very little humor and very little action. What it does have is a lot of cold war espionage - it certainly feels more like a real spy movie than any Bond film of the period, with the notable exception of "From Russia With Love". At the end, the real aim of the film seems to be to reveal the pointlessness and futility of the typical spy games. But since what we just watched WAS a typical spy game, the film ends up feeling pointless and futile itself! Dirk Bogarde is fine as the reluctant spy, Robert Morley is fun as essentially an "M" figure, and the unspeakably gorgeous Sylva Koscina, who starred in several spy movies of this period, reminds us once again what a shame it was that she never got to be a real Bond girl - she would have easily ranked among the Top 3. (**)

Despite occasionally amusing passages this engaging spoof of the nascent spy genre is, however, perhaps not memorable enough to be more than an agreeable time passer.Still, the cast is willing: for most of the film's second half, Dirk Bogarde - playing an unwilling British spy - is forced to sport several ingenious impersonations (waiter, milkman, a typically Bavarian villager, etc.) to evade the pursuing Russian agent Leo McKern. Robert Morley is McKern's British counterpart (but posing as a diplomat) and John Le Mesurier (playing one of Her Majesties' top secret agents) appears in the film's very first (and arguably best) sequence: stopping at what seems to be a reception desk, he proceeds to place on it every kind of gadget one could think of before proclaiming that one of their best agents had been killed and, soon enough, a card showing "007 Deceased" appears on the screen! Sylva Koscina, playing McKern's Ninotchka-like daughter (who also poses as Bogarde's chauffeur) adds the requisite element of sex appeal to the mix when she becomes enamored with her "boss". Another funny sequence takes place when Bogarde is asked to try out an indestructible glass fabric (the work of a German inventor) by throwing a large rock at it; sure enough, the rock bounces onto the floor when it hits, but as they start walking away, the sound of shattering glass is heard on the soundtrack which prompts the Russian factory owner to hiss "You Nazi swine" to the dumb-founded inventor!

Released in the wake of 'From Russia With Love', 'Hot Enough For June' was one of the earliest 007 spoofs. 007 is referred to ( reportedly killed in action! ) in the opening scene. Nicholas Whistler ( Dirk Bogarde ) is dragged out of the dole queue, and sent to Prague by what believes to be a glass-manufacturing company. In actual fact, he is being used as an unwitting secret agent by M15, to recover a stolen Communist formula. Once Whistler realises the awful truth, the film turns into 'The 39 Steps' revisited! Bogarde plays Whistler much like Dr.Simon Sparrow, the best performances come from the irreplaceable Robert Morley as the delightfully droll Colonel Cunliffe, and gruff Leo McKern as his Russian opposite number. Sylva Koscina provides glamour as McKern's daughter, with whom Whistler falls in love. Ralph Thomas expertly mixes the comedy and suspense, the audience is cheering Whistler on as he makes a desperate attempt to enter the British Embassy in Prague at the climax. Good fun.