The Switch

I enjoy watching these old British crime films...... this one is in the Edgar Wallace Mystery type of story and direction.... There's a good few well known British film actors in this including a very funny cameo by Jimmy Hanley, as himself. The film has the typical British humour and even makes reference to Ian Fleming and his James Bond novels including a good guy, Conrad Phillips, just back from Japan and with a few 'spy' gadgets that were super small (for the day 😀) and even two way radios..... disguised as cigarette cases, the film is well worth watching and from my own experience, not readily available, indeed I was lucky enough to catch it on, Talking Pictures TV (They have a website too that you can watch it on if you can't get the channel yourself) ..... if you enjoy these old 1950's or early 1960's films this film will not disappoint....

Customs man Anthony Steel is looking for smuggled watches with the aid of inspector Dermot Walsh. Also Magazine model Zena Marshall is vacationing in France, when charming Arnold Diamond inveigles her to lunch and a drive. Returning home to London, she finds Conrad Phillips has sublet her apartment. His red Sunbeam, identical to the loaner from her service station has been stolen from her garage. Sparks fly, and the next night, her red Sunbeam is also stolen from her garage. The following night, she is dining with Phillips. After he drops her off, she finds herself confronted with a couple of nasty men who want the watches.

It's a nicely set up melodrama, with gallant cops, threatening goons, secret passages, and Dawn Beret playing as annoying a specimen of Muta Flava as you'd never hope to meet. Susan Shaw and Jimmy Hanley have small roles.

The Switch is a standard B feature but on the surface looks as if it should have so much more - a cast led by the trio of Anthony Steel (by now on the downslope of his briefly stellar career), Dermot Walsh (minus famous badger quiff) and Zena Marshall (fresh from cavorting with then spitting at Sean Connery in 'Dr No') - never really takes off.

Nevertheless, there are some nice touches- a 5 minute cameo from Jerry Desmonde, a 10 second cameo by Jimmy Hanley, a few minutes for Susan Shaw in (sadly), her last role, and a hilariously camp Peter Butterworth for a preciously short appearance, and at least two very nice Sunbeam Alpines (the first Bond car and one of several nods to 007). It also has to be mentioned in dispatches that Arnold Diamond is the least convincing Frenchman since 'Allo Allo'.

This is not very remarkable, and there is nothing special about it. Anthony Steel and Conrad Phillips are on the hunt for smugglers of wristwatches, and that gang of professional crooks are so fanatic about their business that they don't hesitate to murder if anyone impedes their activity. Dermot Walsh is also in that customs team, and they take their job dead seriously, intending to stop that gang at any price. There are no shoot-outs but plenty of fighting by the knuckles, and some really get hurt. Even a lady gets caught up in the desperate racket and actually risks getting her throat cut, but naturally it never goes that far in the pictures, and the one corpse of the film is only shown floating head down in the water. It is exciting but very predictable. You will know exactly what will happen next, and nothing will surprise you. The one character that could have been of some interest is the Frenchman Arnold Diamond, and the one almost funny character is Dawn Beret, but this is neither any laughing matter nor even quite serious.

A breezy quickie in which Conrad Phillips and the always glamorous Zena Marshall make a charming couple as they cross the path of the usual bunch of mean-looking crooks.