When London is hit by a series of arson attacks in shops and warehouses, Quentin Barnaby, an insurance investigator, "Daily Express" crime journalist Toby Collins and press photographer Jim Maxwell join forces to find out who is responsible. A sub-plot deals with the fact that both Barnaby and Maxwell are falling in love with Toby. (And no, this isn't a rare example of a film from the early seventies with a gay theme. Despite that masculine-looking Christian name, Toby is young, beautiful and female).
This is a British film with a British setting, but both the leading man (Chad Everett) and the leading lady (Anjanette Comer) are American, even though in both cases they are playing British characters. No doubt this was to increase the marketability of the film in America. In fact, there is something American about the whole style of the film. It is much faster-paced than most British films from this period and the highly dramatic, urgent musical score seems like another transatlantic touch.
Even in 1971, "The Firechasers" was probably little more than a standard programme-filler, and today it is largely forgotten. I am not surprised that mine is only the fourth review it has received. I caught it recently on "London Live", a TV channel which seems to specialise in reviving long-forgotten British movies. I had in fact seen it once before, in the eighties, only a decade or so after it was made, and even then it seemed rather dated. Today it looks very old-fashioned, not only in the costumes, sets and vehicles but also in the general style of its direction, making it look like an over-extended episode of "Softly, Softly" or some other crime drama of the era. The most one can say of it is that it is a reasonably exciting thriller with an unusual twist when the identity of the arsonist is eventually revealed. 5/10
