This movie begins with a bumbling agent for British counter-intelligence named "Stanley Farquhar" (Lionel Jeffries) coming upon a brilliant plan to spy on the Soviet Union. His plan, essentially, is to put a bugging device into a bulldog named "Disraeli" which the British Prime Minister is about to give as a gift to his Soviet counterpart. To help with this plan Stanley blackmails a veterinarian by the name of "Dr. Francis Trevelyon" (Laurence Harvey) who has a predilection for the wives of his clients. At first, everything is a smashing success but this all changes when the Soviet Prime Minister sends his best spy, "Princess Natasha Romanova" (Dahlia Lavi) to Britian to uncover the source of the leaks. Now rather than reveal any more I will just say that this movie certainly had its ups and downs with the inconsistent comedy being the main concern. Fortunately, the presence of Dahlia Lavi-along with decent acting from Lionel Jeffries and Laurence Harvey--definitely improved what normally should have been a very lackluster film and for that reason I have rated it accordingly. Average.
8 Reviews
Women and dogs and kids will always let you down!
mark.waltz24 August 2022
Warning: Spoilers
Man's best friend is the same all over the world, so a gift to the Russian government of a bulldog is seen as a great symbol of brotherhood. Or is it? The bulldog has been fitted with a spying device so every time that the Russian leaders are in contact with the bulldog, the British government can hear everything that they're saying. But of course, you can control a dog when it wants to get out, and unfortunately the adorable pooch runs away. Threats of revealing to the Russian government of what they did creates an international crisis, and for the beautiful Daliah Lavi, having that bit of information could create an international scandal.
A silly but enjoyable film, if a bit out there and unloaded and spots, it features a cast of great British character actors, starting with leading man Laurence Harvey (actually here in the supporting role), and featuring Lionel Jeffries, Denholm Elliott, Eric Sykes, Eric Portman, June Whitfield ("Ab Fab") and the American Paul Ford in a cameo. References to James Bond regular features includes a scene with odd spying contraptions including an umbrella that turns into a parachute. The snorting bulldog of course steals the film, as all dogs do, and there's nothing that these great British thespians can do about it. At least they didn't name the dog Goldpaw or Thunderpooch.
A silly but enjoyable film, if a bit out there and unloaded and spots, it features a cast of great British character actors, starting with leading man Laurence Harvey (actually here in the supporting role), and featuring Lionel Jeffries, Denholm Elliott, Eric Sykes, Eric Portman, June Whitfield ("Ab Fab") and the American Paul Ford in a cameo. References to James Bond regular features includes a scene with odd spying contraptions including an umbrella that turns into a parachute. The snorting bulldog of course steals the film, as all dogs do, and there's nothing that these great British thespians can do about it. At least they didn't name the dog Goldpaw or Thunderpooch.
12 year old at release and knew it was charming and lame.
phlbrq585 May 2021
Now on YT, as an adolescent I saw this on the promise of sexy t&a from previews. Now family fare and a silly premise. Its Lionel Jeffries' movie and he makes it amusing. Operation Kid Brother had fewer laughs more action and t&a.
This comment will self destruct in five sentences
Chip_douglas13 November 2004
The Russian Premier is presented with a British bulldog, who has been fitted with a transmitter (Operation Bandy Legs) by Dr. Francis Trevelyan (Laurence Harvey). The red comrade conveniently takes the dog everywhere (even the opera) and before long 200 Russian agents working in England have been captured. To plug this leak, the Ruskies put Princess (?) Natasha Romanova (Daliah Lavi) on the case. She makes mild mannered Stanley Farquhar (Lionel Jeffries) biggest dream come true: a naked lady waiting when he enters his hotel room. For reasons impossible to dispose here (it could trigger international chaos), the chip must be removed again and only Trevelyan (third best dressed man in the whole world three years running), can do it.
Although the pre-credit sequence and the order of billing would make you believe Harvey, as the ladies man veterinarian, is the lead, he only appears sporadically during the first half of the film. It is Golden Globe nominee Jeffries who carries the picture as the low key counter intelligence agent ridiculed by his wife and children. Daliah Lavi has but a few scenes scattered throughout, but does get to show off some incredible sixties outfits and underwear. Denholm Elliott is wasted as usual, and Erik Sykes plays the kind of stupid assistant who would make Peter Sellers blush.
For a spy spoof there is little action, just some people trying to lure the dog with the help of a mate. It also seems like every character has a funny but difficult to remember surname (or a silly codename). A couple of meaningless references to popular culture immediately fall flat, and the old Get Smart cone of silence (or Sound Proof Bubble as it is called here) is dragged out again for all it's worth. This does provide one amusing bit when Trevelyan loses the only thing he has going for him: the most stuck up British accent ever committed to film.
5 out of 10
Although the pre-credit sequence and the order of billing would make you believe Harvey, as the ladies man veterinarian, is the lead, he only appears sporadically during the first half of the film. It is Golden Globe nominee Jeffries who carries the picture as the low key counter intelligence agent ridiculed by his wife and children. Daliah Lavi has but a few scenes scattered throughout, but does get to show off some incredible sixties outfits and underwear. Denholm Elliott is wasted as usual, and Erik Sykes plays the kind of stupid assistant who would make Peter Sellers blush.
For a spy spoof there is little action, just some people trying to lure the dog with the help of a mate. It also seems like every character has a funny but difficult to remember surname (or a silly codename). A couple of meaningless references to popular culture immediately fall flat, and the old Get Smart cone of silence (or Sound Proof Bubble as it is called here) is dragged out again for all it's worth. This does provide one amusing bit when Trevelyan loses the only thing he has going for him: the most stuck up British accent ever committed to film.
5 out of 10
The h*ll with NATO, indeed
aramis-112-8048806 May 2023
The geniuses behind Tony Hancock, Galton and Simpson, cooked up this little comedy about a veterinarian (a fey Laurence Harvey) enlisted to assist the Secret Service (at the height of the James Bond craze).
"Intelligence" agent Stanley Fahrquar (an hilarious Lionel Jeffries) develops the idea of secreting a microphone in or on a dog given to the Soviet premiere (presumably no actual dogs were harmed in the making of this movie).
And they roll up Soviet agents. Until . . .
Dahlia Lavi is luscious as the femme fatale. It's when cameo actor Paul Ford is seduced by Lavi that he makes the NATO remark.
Two stories exist about this flick: one, that Peter Sellers was to play the Jeffries role; the other that the notorious sensitive Sellers was earmarked for the Harvey role but refused to appear with prime scene stealer Jeffries. I can't untangle it. Sellers could have played both but for once I'm just as glad he didn't.
It's very funny at the start but begins running out of steam. Still, it has enough giggles to make it worth a peek.
"Intelligence" agent Stanley Fahrquar (an hilarious Lionel Jeffries) develops the idea of secreting a microphone in or on a dog given to the Soviet premiere (presumably no actual dogs were harmed in the making of this movie).
And they roll up Soviet agents. Until . . .
Dahlia Lavi is luscious as the femme fatale. It's when cameo actor Paul Ford is seduced by Lavi that he makes the NATO remark.
Two stories exist about this flick: one, that Peter Sellers was to play the Jeffries role; the other that the notorious sensitive Sellers was earmarked for the Harvey role but refused to appear with prime scene stealer Jeffries. I can't untangle it. Sellers could have played both but for once I'm just as glad he didn't.
It's very funny at the start but begins running out of steam. Still, it has enough giggles to make it worth a peek.
Amusing if sluggish spy comedy, sparked by the sexy Daliah Lavi
gridoon202424 September 2010
Warning: Spoilers
"The Spy With A Cold Nose" begins with an absurdly clever (or is that "cleverly absurd"?) idea, but due to a sluggish script and Daniel Petrie's rather static direction, it never really reaches the comic heights it was probably shooting for. Lionel Jeffries (who is clearly the star of the film despite his third billing) is amusing as a secret service agent who is pretty much the exact opposite of James Bond in every aspect but finally gets his one chance at fame (or infamy, if things go wrong). Daliah Lavi only appears after the first 40 minutes, but burns up the screen as usual; whether fully-dressed or half-naked, Lavi is curvy and sexy. The film on the whole is pleasant and easy to take, but not much more than that. Terrific score by Riz Ortolani. ** out of 4.
Classic British comedy
Adrian Sweeney1 July 2007
This is hilarious and I think one of my favourite films ever. Reasons to see it: It was written by Galton and Simpson, writers of 'Hancock' and 'Steptoe and Son', on top form.
It stars British comedy super-god Lionel Jeffries, and is his finest hour and a half (apart from directing 'The Railway Children').
It co-stars two other absolute gods of British cinema, Laurence Harvey and Eric Portman. I don't think I've seen either of them in a comedy apart from this, and I don't know why not because they're brilliant in it. Also Colin Blakely as the Russian premiere. And Denholm Elliott and Eric Sykes, both of whom I'd completely forgotten about until I re-watched it, which is a measure of how good the others are. And holding up the American end, the colonel out of Bilko, briefly.
In a nutshell, Jeffries is a downtrodden suburban family man and low-grade spy with James Bond fantasies who masterminds a cunning scheme to obtain intelligence by surgically implanting a radio transmitter in a dog presented to the Russian leader (the cold-nosed spy of the title), aided by Harvey as a high-tone society vet with a terrible secret. Perhaps it's just Jeffries' ballpark resemblance to him, but I was reminded a bit of some of S. J. Perelman's stuff, that character he created for himself of the put-upon shlub with delusions of grandeur and dreams of romance, yanked out of his golden reveries by the banal importunities of wife and kids. But of course it's also a recurring character in British comedy - similar to the ones Galton and Simpson wrote so gloriously in Hancock and Steptoe but with an added dash of irritability - that character of the neurotic, frustrated Napoleon of Suburbia - growing up everyone in Britain had a friend with a slightly scary Dad like this. Jeffries nails it here. Perhaps the funniest of the early scenes are the ones with him at home, the tetchy paterfamilias overrun by his noisy children and wife June Whitfield ('Can't you control your spawn?' he snaps).
While most of the comedy comes from the Jeffries character, as I say Laurence Harvey is a comic revelation as a suave combination of gigolo and quack and the clash between them is great. It is very British and I suspect a bit old-fashioned for some people's tastes. Connoisseurs of Groovy London films should look out for one of those gratuitous pop-music and dance scenes the American producers insisted on inserting - in this case a completely unexplained sequence of Daliah Lavi dancing energetically by herself - but the swinging 60s elements are really just superimposed on a film that for the most part harks back to an earlier era.
Anyway, I found it hysterical, and have no idea why it isn't better known. If you like this kind of thing, then this is the kind of thing you'll love.
It stars British comedy super-god Lionel Jeffries, and is his finest hour and a half (apart from directing 'The Railway Children').
It co-stars two other absolute gods of British cinema, Laurence Harvey and Eric Portman. I don't think I've seen either of them in a comedy apart from this, and I don't know why not because they're brilliant in it. Also Colin Blakely as the Russian premiere. And Denholm Elliott and Eric Sykes, both of whom I'd completely forgotten about until I re-watched it, which is a measure of how good the others are. And holding up the American end, the colonel out of Bilko, briefly.
In a nutshell, Jeffries is a downtrodden suburban family man and low-grade spy with James Bond fantasies who masterminds a cunning scheme to obtain intelligence by surgically implanting a radio transmitter in a dog presented to the Russian leader (the cold-nosed spy of the title), aided by Harvey as a high-tone society vet with a terrible secret. Perhaps it's just Jeffries' ballpark resemblance to him, but I was reminded a bit of some of S. J. Perelman's stuff, that character he created for himself of the put-upon shlub with delusions of grandeur and dreams of romance, yanked out of his golden reveries by the banal importunities of wife and kids. But of course it's also a recurring character in British comedy - similar to the ones Galton and Simpson wrote so gloriously in Hancock and Steptoe but with an added dash of irritability - that character of the neurotic, frustrated Napoleon of Suburbia - growing up everyone in Britain had a friend with a slightly scary Dad like this. Jeffries nails it here. Perhaps the funniest of the early scenes are the ones with him at home, the tetchy paterfamilias overrun by his noisy children and wife June Whitfield ('Can't you control your spawn?' he snaps).
While most of the comedy comes from the Jeffries character, as I say Laurence Harvey is a comic revelation as a suave combination of gigolo and quack and the clash between them is great. It is very British and I suspect a bit old-fashioned for some people's tastes. Connoisseurs of Groovy London films should look out for one of those gratuitous pop-music and dance scenes the American producers insisted on inserting - in this case a completely unexplained sequence of Daliah Lavi dancing energetically by herself - but the swinging 60s elements are really just superimposed on a film that for the most part harks back to an earlier era.
Anyway, I found it hysterical, and have no idea why it isn't better known. If you like this kind of thing, then this is the kind of thing you'll love.
It's funny!
RodrigAndrisan8 November 2020
It made me laugh a little, which hasn't happened to me in a long time. When the boss sees Stanley Farquhar(Lionel Jeffries) without a hand and says "I'm sorry!", Farquhar replies, "I left it in the office." Then I laughed again when Francis Trevelyan (Laurence Harvey) told one of his mistresses, a married woman, to buy more dogs, to have more reasons to meet. There is also a lovely scene with the "comrade princess" Natasha Romanova(the gorgeous Daliah Lavi who left us in 2017) in the Kremlin. OK, I won't tell you the whole movie, how many others do, it's great fun, watch it, I recommend it with confidence! Lionel Jeffries is very funny, the funniest of all actually, then the old secretary who's a bit deaf, a mock of Moneypenny, she is delicious and the music of the Italian Riz Ortolani is cool, cheerful.
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