The Mackintosh Man is a 1973 British cold war spy thriller film directed by John Huston and starring Paul Newman, James Mason, Dominique Sanda and Ian Bannen. It was produced by John Foreman and William Hill as associate producer from a screenplay by Walter Hill and William Fairchild based on the novel The Freedom Trap by Desmond Bagley. The music score was by Maurice Jarre and the cinematography by Oswald Morris. It was made by the Newman-Foreman Company and Warner Bros.
The film stars Paul Newman, Dominique Sanda and James Mason with Harry Andrews, Ian Bannen, Michael Hordern, Nigel Patrick, Peter Vaughan, Roland Culver, Leo Genn, Percy Herbert and Robert Lang.
Production
The film was shot in the UK, Republic of Ireland and Malta. It and the book it is adapted from, are loosely based on the exposure and defection of George Blake, a Soviet agent in British intelligence. The scene where Slade and Rearden escape from prison are inspired by Blake's escape from Wormwood Scrubs in 1966. The jail scenes were filmed at Liverpool Prison.
Cast
Plot
Joseph Rearden (Newman), an agent of British Intelligence arrives in London and makes a rendezvous with Mackintosh (Andrews), the head of his organisation in a discreet office located just off Trafalgar Square. Mackintosh and his deputy, Mrs Smith (Sanda), inform him of a simple way to steal diamonds which are transported via the post service to avoid attention. This he does, apparently getting successfully away after punching a postman, and making off with the diamond-filled parcel. However, that evening, in his hotel room he is paid a visit by two Metropolitan Police detectives who have received an anonymous phone call advising them about the robbery. They are unconvinced by Newman's pretence to be an innocent Australian who had recently arrived in London.
The Judge at his trial is angered by the failure to recover the stolen diamonds from Rearden, who he believes has stashed them away somewhere, and sentences him to twenty years in jail. Rearden is shipped off to a bleak prison in the North of England. He slowly begins to blend in with the other prisoners, and is assigned to laundry-washing duties. A few days after entering he encounters Slade (Bannen), a former British spy who has been exposed as a KGB mole, who is being kept in high security. He makes innocent enquiries of his fellow inmates about Slade - but not a great deal is known about him.
A few weeks after his entry into prison, he is approached by a well-spoken inmate who offers to act as a go-between with an organisation that can spring him from the prison in exchange for a large cut of the stolen diamonds. They are used to helping prisoners escape, and have another exit planned shortly which he can join if he is prepared to put up the money - to which he agrees. Two days later a diversion is arranged, and smoke bombs are hurled over the walls. Using the smokescreen Rearden and a fellow prisoner, who turns out to be Slade, are lifted over the walls by a cargo net and then driven away at high speed. They are then drugged by a needle injection and taken to a secret location - somewhere in wild, deserted countryside. When Slade and Rearden wake up they are told that they will be kept there for a week until the man hunt for them dies down.
In London Mackintosh discreetly monitors the progress of Rearden. His entry into prison has been a planned sting operation to smoke out the organisation. It is now intended that they will be raided, rounded up and Slade returned to prison. Following a speech attacking the handling of the Slade escape by an old friend and war comrade, Sir George Wheeler MP (Mason) in the House of Commons Mackintosh approaches him and advises him it would be better to remain silent or risk embarrassing himself. Wheeler, however, despite masquerading as a staunchly patriotic right-winger, is in fact a Communist and an agent of the KGB. He immediately tips off the head of the organisation where Rearden is being held. Mackintosh had in fact suspected Wheeler, and had used their meeting to try and flush him out. Before he can act, he is deliberately run down by a car, and dies soon afterwards.
Rearden now falls under suspicion where is being held, and they now began to doubt his claims to be an Australian criminal, beating him violently and savaging him with a guard dog. He manages to eventually fight back and escape the building, setting it on fire. He makes out across country - pursued by his guards and the dog. He is finally forced to drown the dog in a stream to throw his assailants off the scent. He then makes it to a nearby town, where he discover he is on the West Coast of Ireland and has been apparently staying on the estate of a close friend of Sir George Wheeler. He contacts Mrs Smith in London who flies to meet him in Galway. Realising that Slade has been smuggled out of Ireland on the private yacht of Wheeler, they now head to Valetta on Malta where Wheeler is now heading.
Once there they try and infiltrate one of Wheeler's parties and discover the whereabouts of Slade. Wheeler soon recognised Mrs Smith (who is in fact the daughter of his old friend Mackintosh) and drugs her and takes her inside the boat. Rearden tries to get the Maltese police to raid the boat, but they refuse to believe so respected a man as Wheeler could be involved in kidnapping and treason, and instead they move to arrest Rearden - who is still a wanted man for his earlier faked diamond robbery.
Rearden is again forced to flee, but he manages to follow Wheeler to a temple where he is holding Slade. He pulls a gun on them, and orders them to hand over Slade. Presented with a Mexican Standoff Wheeler and Slade try and persuade Rearden to let them go unharmed, in return for which they will also spare him and Mrs Smith. Reluctantly Rearden agrees. Mrs Smith takes up a gun and shoots Slade and Rearden, avenging the murder of her father. She has fulfilled her orders, and bitterly abandons Rearden - angry at the way he has not followed his.
Reception
The film received a mixed reception when it was released, and did not perform well at the box office in either the United Kingdom, United States or Canada.
External links
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Films directed by John Huston |
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