In Like Flint (1967)
Review by Doc Ezra
Film:
DVD:

Written by Hal Fimberg
Directed by Gordon Douglas
Starring James Coburn, Lee J. Cobb, Jean Hale, and Andrew Duggan

Features:

• Theatrical trailers
  
• English and French audio
  
• English and Spanish subtitles
  

Rating: NR, suitable for audiences 13+

Anamorphic: Yes, 2.35:1 widescreen

My Advice: Pass.

Another of Fox's early (some might say premature) entries into the field of Bond spoof-dom, In Like Flint details the continuing adventures of Derek Flint (Coburn), some time after he concludes his mission in Our Man Flint. This time, he's contacted because his friend Lloyd Cramden (Cobb) seems to be missing a few minutes of his life. During an afternoon round of golf with the President of the United States, Cramden somehow lost a few minutes.

What neither of them know yet is that a conglom of wealthy Stepford women have a cunning plan to take over the world, and it involves beauty salon hairdryers and a secretly developed space launch facility...somehow. But it's never terribly clear how all these clever bits fit together to spell domination. They do have a clone of the President, and they do manage to sub him in for the genuine article during the aforementioned golf game. And then they promptly vanish from the picture for over an hour.

The biggest problem with this film is that it comes across as completely aimless. The story meanders about placidly, with no obvious concern for getting to anything vaguely resembling a point. The chief villain(esses) appear(s) at the opening of the film, and not again for a very long time. When they do pop back into the picture, you spend more time trying to figure out where they've been than paying attention to what they're doing (which isn't terribly clear, anyway). I'm not sure if this is a problem of script, direction, or editing, so rather than single anybody out I'm blaming it on the lot of them.

Coburn makes another valiant go at Flint, but this time without an even mediocre script. Between chirping at dolphins and being thrust into a ballet performance, there's no real dignity for Flint in this one. The script uses him for the butt of the gag almost as often as his foes, which undercuts the film terribly. It's almost as if the people behind the movie were attempting to simultaneously mock their chosen object (spy films) and themselves (and not particularly kindly, either).

The DVD hands over the movie with a nice digital transfer and not much else. I can't say as this one deserves much, though, and am still trying to understand what the impetus was to get it out on disc in the first place. I suppose it might sucker a few Austin Powers fans (particularly since the packaging copy is rife with references to Flint as the "original man of mystery"), but a good number of them will be attempting to return the thing within a few days.

The first one was so-so, and this one is just plain bad. In Like Flint serves as a cautionary tale to those that think what Mike Myers has been doing is easy. It plainly is not. And falling short of the mark doesn't mean a passably funny movie. It means a tragically unfunny movie. Give it a miss.