The Trouble with Spies

British spymaster Robert Morley gets incompetent spy Donald Sutherland to go to Ibiza, when a new drug developed by the Russians is being sold.

It's based on Marc MacShane's novel APPLE PIE IN THE SKY, one of fourteen comic spy novels about the incompetent Appleton Porter. Burt Kennedy wrote and directed the movie, and he hired such reliable comedy performers as Ned Beatty, Ruth Gordon (in her last movie appearance), and Robert Morley. The result is singularly free from much humor. Oh, you may find it funny to watch Morley tell Sutherland what an idiot he is without Sutherland noticing, or Sutherland disguising himself in immense facial hair and a Hawaiian shirt, but it's all done in a rather straightforward fashion, with Sutherland lucking into surviving by pure chance. Even location shooting in Ibiza doesn't help.

this is just terrible. It has an impressive cast but wow, this thing stinks on ice. I was prompted to hit the net looking for what could have been going on in Sutherland's life to set off such a stink bomb in what is otherwise a stellar career. He looks thin. He isn't really in character, he's just phoning it in. Some of the supporting cast look and act like they're from Hammer studios. He doesn't connect with them at all. Ruth Gordon has a few moments that help remind us what acting is supposed to be like, even with the shoddy material she's given to work with. Overall, this thing looks done on the super-cheap: sets are flimsy feel like a sound stage, lighting design looks almost fluorescent, actors are poorly made up with blotchy uneven makeup, and the comic bits of business are straight out of a Three Stooges matinée flick (check out the street scene where he nearly gets run over, in the beginning). It was so painful to watch that I just had to bail. What I cannot fathom is how this thing was put together to start with, I mean was he doing this as a favor to the director? He couldn't possibly have been doing it for some quick money (assuming he was broke or a drug addict or something else leading to dire straits)--there was obviously NO money involved in this flick. His career has been on an even keel, he never went into the dumps like Micky Ruorke or Dennis Hopper. If he didn't do it as a favor to a has-been one-trick pony director, then it's a complete MYSTERY to me. You'd have to be pretty drunk to watch this thing. And even that is iffy.

There are two VERY bad things about this film that made me assume it would stink. First, after being made it sat for three years...probably the best determinate that it is a bad movie. Second, Michael Caine was offered the lead....and he refused it. Now to put it in context, the great actor Michael Caine made quite a bit of crap in the 1980s...films he admitted he only made for the money. But apparently, there was a limit!

Donald Sutherland plays a bumbling spy...sort of like Inspector Clouseau mixed with Johnny English. But these two characters are COMIC characters...but Sutherland's bumbler is played straight. He's sent on an assignment where he is assumed he will die...which is why they picked him because he's so expendable. What follows is, bluntly put, pretty stupid with some of the most ridiculous and dumb murder attempts by the KGB (such as dangling a scorpion onto him in his room...even though scorpion bites are almost never fatal).

The bottom line is that several excellent actors (not just Sutherland but Ruth Gordon, for instance) are totally wasted due to a bad script and filmmakers who seemed indifferent about their 'craft'. Overall, a very bad beginning for HBO Pictures...but fortunately they learned from their mistakes and made some very nice films AFTER this one.

British officer porter in a mission in Ibiza, where his mate trent got missing. In a few scenes he should got killes, but he's glad, they failed. Mona, his host, turns out to work for the "usual tricks"-department of the KGB.

What a great "blast from the past"!! Totally love both Ruth Gordon and Donald Sutherland. Loved how incompetent the Russians were - and how the governments covered their a**es, so obvious today, even if covered up in the past.

I guess I need to add some more characters in order for this to be valid, so here goes....

why did we like the movie? First of all, we didn't see it when it first came out, so it was a first for us. Second, we liked most of the actors, and the synopsis looked interesting.

But, as stated above, we liked the premise and wanted to give it a chance. While some of the movie was a bit of a stretch, we liked it a lot, even though IMDB requires lengthy reviews, lmao.