Silly but saved by Sharon… The Wrecking Crew (1968)

Sixties comic strip, multi-coloured pseudo-psychedelia, soundtracked by easy legend Hugo Montenegro in an attempt to make the likeable but seasoned, Rat Pack crooner hip enough for families with an increasingly-diverse cultural agenda… is there any point in watching The Wrecking Crew in 2014?

Yes it’s proto-Austen Powers Bond spoofery has genuine period charm and there are lots of groovy chicks and kung fu kicks on view (Bruce Lee choreographed the violence) but Dean Martin as a fifty-something photographer-cum-special agent? Then again, how can you take the mickey out of a film that’s way ahead of you on that score?

Dean adds up his fees for the four Helm films

Dean involves you in the joke and the joke is that he’s getting paid to walk through things pretty much as himself: singing re-worded Martin standards every time he encounters yet another beautiful woman willing to “lie down” with him to talk and always seeking out the drinks cabinet in every room he enters.

It’s knowing, exploitative and laid back, everyone loves some Deano sometimes and… we can’t just watch Antonioni and Bergman all of the time can we?

Sharon Tate

But what really made this film worthy of comment was watching Sharon Tate as the seemingly bumbling Danish tourist guide Freya Carlson who (obviously) is also a spy. This was the last of her films released before her brutal murder in August 1969 and you watch her all too aware of her tragedy to come. Yet the more I watched the more I thought that she should be remembered for her abilities and achievements rather than the manner of her exit (no matter how horrific and senseless).

The Wrecking Crew is far from the best film she made but she makes her mark with what she had and is energetic, funny and, of course, beautiful. On this evidence she was a versatile actress who would have made many interesting films but we have to appreciate those that she did make in her short span and pay her the tribute of remembering her as a person and not a victim. And this silly, occasionally funny, period piece is a part of her professional life.

Nigel Green - saved by his enduring sense of the ridiculous

The fourth in the Matt Helm series, The Wrecking Crew follows the existing formula of gadgets and girls with Helm (Dean Martin) up against a teched-up, organised and delightfully nasty baddy Count Contini (played by the always excellent Nigel Green who always seems so earnestly world-weary). Contini and his well-drilled mob hi-jack a trainload of gold bullion from a train in Denmark and are intent on using it to destabilise the markets of the western world.

Elke makes an entrance...

Contini is aided by his psychotic-but-lovely left-hand woman Linka Karensky (Elke Sommer) who makes a quite stunning entry in a close-fitting white dress slashed almost to her waist -  they really don’t make spies quite this curvaceous anymore… along with the alluring martial artist Wen Yu-Rang (Nancy Kwan).

After the robbery, the secret service calls Helm away from a surreal garden party/photo-shoot with a bevy of outlandishly attired models. He is briefed by commander 'Mac' MacDonald (John Larch) and told to follow the action to Denmark and to seek out Contini’s former confidant and squeeze, as Lola Medina (Tina Louise... as statuesque as Sommer).

Dean Martin meets Tina Louise

Helm meets Freya in his hotel and is immediately impressed by her legs if not her competency – geeky glasses and clumsy as Clark Kent she can’t be the real deal… or can she

Helm encounters Lola who seems very keen to unburden herself of Contini’s secret plan along with most of her clothes. Sadly, her former boss is ahead of the game and blows her up. Next he gets a visit from Wen Yu-Rang who is similarly drawn to Matt Helm’s magnetism: even though these women mean to kill him they want to enjoy the moment first – psycho-analyse that?!

Nancy Kwan holds talks with Dean Martin

Freya is on hand to get in the way/save the day and the two are chased up to a ski-lift by Wen’s men and we Martin performing some of the moves Bruce Lee put together – not too shabby Dean!

It’s only a matter of time before Linka tries her luck and she proves a match for Helm hiding one more gun than he expected but… so impressed is she that she wants to share the loot with him… or does she?

Everything careers towards the inevitable conclusions and you know at some point it’ll be down to a scrap between Matt and Contini but not before some entertaining gadgetry at the latter’s mansion as Helm tries to avoid being inadvertently fried by Freya. We also have a car chase in which Matt reveals that he keeps are large chopper in his boot… he and Freya assemble the mini-copter in record time and fly off to hopefully stop Contini as he heads off with the billion in bullion to a suspiciously Californian-looking Luxembourg….

 Dusty verdict: Undemanding comfort cinema is an understatement but this is a period piece worth saving for a rainy day when all you can handle is bright entertainment. Matey Martin along for the laughs and it’s really no hardship watching Louise, Kwan, Sommer and the luminous Tate.

The Wrecking Crew is freely available from all good Amazons and there's also a boxed set of all four films if you've got flu or a really bad hang-over.

Matt Helm at his day job... really.

Bruce Lee got Dean kicking

Why Miss Carlson, without your glasses, etc...

Sorry, what's the plot again?