The Ambushers (film)
The Ambushers | |
---|---|
Henry Levin | |
Screenplay by | Herbert Baker |
Based on | The Ambushers by Donald Hamilton |
Produced by | Irving Allen |
Starring | |
Cinematography | |
Edited by | Harold F. Kress |
Music by | Hugo Montenegro |
Production company | Meadway-Claude Productions Company |
Distributed by | Columbia Pictures |
Release date |
|
Running time | 102 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Budget | $4 million[1] |
Box office | $10 million (US/Canada)[2] |
The Ambushers is a 1967 American
Plot
Helm is sent to the ICE (Intelligence and Counter Espionage) Training Headquarters to uncover a traitor in the organisation. While there he meets ICE agent Sheila Sommers, a test pilot who has been recovered from a Central American jungle with no memory of what happened to the experimental flying saucer she flew. Due to the electro-magnetic power of the saucer, only a woman is able to fly it, as males of the species are killed by the energy.
Helm had worked with Sommers on an assignment where the two had posed as man and wife. When Sommers meets Helm, her memory comes back. Mac, the head of ICE, decides to send Helm and Sommers (posing again as his wife) undercover as a photographer doing a story on the Montezuma Beer Brewery, whose advertising jingle is the same tune as the anthem of Ortega's political movement.
Along the way, they must deal with Ortega's henchmen, Francesca Madeiros (an operative for Big O, Helm's main nemesis), who poses as a model and seduces Helm, an assassin named Nassim and a tough thug named Rocco.
Themes
The film was the third of four produced in the late 1960s starring Martin as secret agent
The Ambushers features a scene similar to one in the later James Bond film Live and Let Die (1973), in which one of the hero's love interests is stripped of her clothes by way of a magnetic gadget.
Cast
- Dean Martin as Matt Helm
- Senta Berger as Francesca Madeiros
- Janice Rule as Sheila Sommers
- James Gregory as MacDonald
- Albert Salmi as Jose Ortega
- Kurt Kasznar as Quintana
- Beverly Adams as Lovey Kravezit
- John Brascia as Rocco
Production
The film was originally known as The Devastators.[3]
Reception
This film is generally considered the weakest of the four Helm films, and is cited in the book The Fifty Worst Films of All Time by Harry and Michael Medved. The Medveds also cited a review of The Ambushers by critic Judith Crist which stated: "The sole distinction of this vomitous mess is that it just about reaches the nadir of witlessness, smirky sexiness and bad taste – and it's dull, dull, dull to boot."[4]
Box office
The film earned
Soundtrack
See also
References
- ProQuest 155816374.
- ^ a b "The Ambushers, Box Office Information". The Numbers. Retrieved October 5, 2020.
- ^ Martin, Betty (Jan 8, 1966). "Third Matt Helm Film Slated". Los Angeles Times. p. 17.
- Saint Petersburg Times, September 15, 1978 (p.16 D).
- ^ "Big Rental Films of 1968". Variety. January 8, 1969. p. 15. Please note this figure is a rental accruing to distributors.
External links
- The Ambushers at IMDb
- The Ambushers at AllMovie
- The Ambushers at Rotten Tomatoes
- The Ambushers at the American Film Institute Catalog
- The Ambushers at the TCM Movie Database