Main Cast: James Mason, Simone Signoret, Maximilian Schell, Harriet Andersson, Lynn Redgrave, Harry Andrews
Release Year: 1967
Country: US/UK
Run Time: 107 minutes
Plot
John LeCarre's Call for the Dead was the basis for this gloomy, complex spy story. James Mason plays a British secret agent puzzled by the sudden suicide of Foreign Office higher-up Robert Flemyng. Mason had worked on Flemyng's security clearance himself, and can't fathom what personality quirk he might have missed. The agent suspects that the dead man's wife (Simone Signoret), a concentration camp survivor, may hold the answer to Flemyng's despair, but the Foreign Office wants Mason to drop the case. Mason hires retiring Inspector Harry Andrews to do some private detective work. What Mason and Andrews find out is more insidious than they've imagined; worse, Mason is saddled with a new dilemma--his wife (Harriet Andersson) has been unfaithful with a colleague (Maximillian Schell). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Review
Sidney Lumet's The Deadly Affair comes out of the same tradition (and from the same source-author) as Martin Ritt's The Spy Who Came In From The Cold -- and it manages to be just as grim and absorbing, even amid the beautiful color cinematography of Freddy Young, who still manages to make London look drab and threatening. James Mason gives a beautifully understated performance as an intelligence agent who finds himself caught amid a bureaucratic maze that may be shielding an intelligence disaster -- one that may be a lot closer to home on two different fronts than he would like to admit. He gets great support from a cast that is more than first rate from top to bottom. The plot may be a little more complicated than devotees of 1960's espionage films are accustomed to seeing, but that's the way with John LeCarre's stories -- this one is a little simpler than The Spy Who Came In From The Cold but also very viscerally compelling, and overall this is about as good an espionage/mystery thriller as came out of anywhere in the decade in which it was made, and even mansges to work in some much-needed and welcomed moments of sardonic humor, amid its seriousness -- a difference that might make it preferable to much of its competition of the era, including Ritt's The Spy Who Came In From The Cold. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
Kenneth Haigh - Bill Appleby; Roy Kinnear - Adam Scarr; Max Adrian - Adviser; Robert Flemyng - Samuel Fennan; Corin Redgrave - David; David Warner - Edward; Michael Bryant - Gaveston; Paul Hardwick - Young Mortimer; Charles Kay - Lightborn; Timothy West - Matrevis; Les White - Harek; June Murphy - Witch; Frank Williams - Second Witch; John Dimech - Waiter; Julian Sherrier - Waiter; Petra Markham - Daughter at Theater; Dennis Shaw - Landlord; Maria Charles - Blonde; Amanda Walker - Brunette; Sheraton Blount - Eunice Scarr; Janet Hargreaves - Ticket Clerk; Michael Brennan - Barman; Richard Steele - Businessman; Gertan Klauber - Businessman; Margaret Lacey - Mrs. Bird; Murray Brown; David Quilter; Leslie Sands - Inspector; Terence Sewards; William Dysart
Credit
John Howell - Art Director, Cynthia Tingey - Costume Designer, Ted Sturgis - First Assistant Director, Sidney Lumet - Director, Thelma Connell - Editor, Quincy Jones - Composer (Music Score), Jill Carpenter - Makeup, Freddie Young - Cinematographer, Sidney Lumet - Producer, Denis O'Dell - Producer, Astrud Gilberto - Singer, Pamela Cornell - Set Designer, Paul Dehn - Screenwriter, John Le Carré - Book Author
Charles Dobbs (James Mason) is a British secret agent investigating the apparent suicide of Foreign Office official Samuel Fennan. Dobbs suspects that Fennan's wife, Elsa (Simone Signoret), a survivor of an extermination camp, might have some clues, but other officials want Dobbs to drop the case. Dobbs hires a retired police inspector, Mendel (Harry Andrews), to quietly make inquiries. As they uncover some horrible implications, Dobbs also discovers that his wife Ann (Harriet Andersson) has been having an affair with a colleague, Dieter Frey (Maximilian Schell).
Director Sidney Lumet said of James Mason "I always thought he was one of the best actors who ever lived. Whatever you gave him to do he would take it, assimilate it and then make it his own. The technique was rock solid, and I fell in love with him as an actor, so every time I came across a script I wanted to direct I would start to read it thinking is there anything here for James? He had no sense of stardom at all. He wanted good billing and the best money he could get, but then all he ever thought about was how to play the part. In that sense he reminded me more of an actor in a theatre repertory ensemble than a movie star, and it was what made him so good." Lumet also directed Mason in The Sea Gull (1968), Child's Play (1972) and The Verdict (1982).[1]
Cinematographer Freddie Young's technique of pre-exposing (or "pre-fogging") colour film to create a muted colour pallette was first used in this film.[3] Lumet called the result "colorless color".[1]
Awards and honours
The Deadly Affair received five BAFTA Awards nominations, for Best British Film for Sidney Lumet, Best British Screenplay for Paul Dehn, Best British Cinematography (Colour) for Freddie Young, Best Foreign Actress for Simone Signoret, and for Best British Actor for James Mason, but did not win any of the awards.[4]
