La vallée des aigles

The Cold War was seldom chillier than this travelogue set in Lapland that begins with wintry location work in Stockholm (were we encounter Isak Borg's mother, Naima Wifstrund, and Gösta Cederlund, who had recently featured in Bergman's own Cold War drama, 'This Can't Happen Here'), before hero John McCallum and copper Jack Warner set off it hot pursuit of the film's 'MacGuffin': rectifiers & condensers for a device for converting sound waves into enough energy to light an entire city or (if the Baddies get their way) level them.

But this is just a pretext for a chase thriller framed around footage of reindeer, wolves and an avalanche with the Swedish actors dubbed into English and most of the rest shot back at Pinewood (which is presumably where the scenes featuring Christopher Lee & Euan Solon as a grim-faced pair of detectives were shot). Director Terence Young was reunited a few years later with villain Anthony Dawson on 'Dr No'.

Valley of Eagles recently came on BBC2 one afternoon so I set the video and was certainly pleased I did.

A scientist who has invented a machine that can convert sound waves into electrical energy has this stolen by his wife and assistant and this results in a chase across the frozen wastes of Lapland. The scientist teams up with a copper and they join a party who is transporting reindeer the same route. They face many dangers on the way: blizzards, a pack of hungry wolves and avalanches. A lot of the wolves are killed by some eagles that Laplanders use for killing instead of guns to reduce the risk of an avalanche which would result in their village being destroyed. The scientist catches up with his wife and assistant and escape and once the assistant stars shooting a gun, this results in an avalanche and both are killed but the village is safe. The scientist also finds a new love at the end.

Valley of Eagles contains some fantastic scenery in Lapland and has a good score too. Animal lovers probably won't enjoy this though. The snow scenes remind me of the Wilderness Family movies.

The cast includes Jack Warner (Dixon of Dock Green, The Quatermass Xperiment), John McCallum, Anthony Dawson and Nadia Gray. Horror legend Christopher Lee (Dracula) has a small part as a copper.

Valley of Eagles is certainly worth seeing, just for that scenery. Excellent.

Rating: 4 stars out of 5.

A below par British action thriller. I use both words in their broadest terms as what is supposed to be a chase across the Finish mountains turns into a nature film on the lives of the Laplanders for a large length of the film.

The lead characters deliver their lines so woodenly that if you closed your eyes they could be reading out loud from a drawing room in Hampstead Heath, so any attempt at pace is lost, not that there was much of an attempt in the first place.

If anything you have to sympathise with one of the villains, on the grounds that they want to 'get away from it all'.

Only worth while if it is on TV on a wet afternoon, when it is marginally better than watching rain hitting the window.

The gist of this story is settled pretty quickly as a secret sonic device is pinched by "Sven" (Anthony Dawson) and "Helga" (Mary Laura Wood) the wife of it's inventor from their Stockholm home. Off they set across country, making for Finland and then the USSR. Hot on their tails are intrepid detective "Peterson" (Jack Warner) and the scientist "Ahlen" (John McCallum) who are both determined to stop them before they can sell the gadget to the Soviets. The espionage elements of this are all relatively plain sailing, but the photography of the Arctic wilderness as they give chase is what really makes this worth a gander. There are reindeer by the hundreds being herded by the locals; their lives free of technology and their innate friendliness meaning that these folks look after all comers. Just as that helps those pursuing, it helped those fleeing too. It all culminates in a pristine valley where the snow clings, precariously, to the sides of the mountains ensuring that the local population use only eagles to hunt - silence isn't so much golden as essential. Can the chasing pair catch up with their antagonists in time? Warner really only ever had one gear, and he doesn't challenge himself (or us) with his characterisation here. Dawson delivers competently as he usually does when he is the baddie, and the others contribute adequately, if maybe just a bit too verbosely, as the adventure slowly advances amidst the snow and ice to a denouement that is just a little different. It's nothing special, this film, but I thought the last ten minutes just about made it worth the watch - and, yes, there are a few eagles, too.

Interesting early work from director Terence Young who directed the first James Bond film Dr. No.

A scientist (John McCallum) in Norway invents a machine that converts sound-waves into electricity. The scientist initially thinks that his wife may have been kidnapped but his wife has conspired with his assistant to steal it and sell it to the Soviets. The inventor and a police officer pursue them in the icy wilderness of Lapland.

Anthony Dawson plays the treacherous assistant, he played a villain in Dr. No.

The film starts out as a cold war espionage thriller then becomes a survival film with bears, wolves and eagles. Yet with Jack Warner as Inspector Peterson who plays disbelieving policeman at first it becomes a police procedural until he joins the scientist in the hunt.

This is an unusual British B film for the time, it shifts focus too many times and by the end has lost the plot somewhat. It does not help that film has little tension and the leads are rather wooden.

Still it is worthwhile to spot early parts for the likes of Christoper Lee and see how the director's subsequent career was shaped.