Opération Goldman

Anthony Eisley is cast as Harry Sennet, a top secret agent who goes into action to foil a bad guy who keeps interfering with rocket launches, using a weapon that he somehow managed to put on the moon. Sometimes Harry gets help from his boss, Captain Flanagan (stunning brunette Diana Lorys), but mostly he goes it alone.

There certainly were plenty of these "James Bond" imitations and spoofs to come out of the 1960s, and "Lightning Bolt" a.k.a. "Operazione Goldman" provides quite a bit of enjoyment. Granted, a fair amount of the entertainment value is derived from the various absurdities on display:

Sennet attempts to stop a rocket launch by driving right into the tower. Needless to say, this does not go well.

He actually attacks the bad guy when his nemesis has plenty of time to see him coming, and the henchmen have enough time to get there first and beat him up.

Plus, he actually tries to bribe some of the bad guys with cheques! (He's usually allowed to spare no expense during his missions.)

Our dastardly villainous mastermind is Mr. Rehte, played with brio by corpulent Italian Folco Lulli. You have to love this guy: not only does he have big plans for domination of the Earth, he also has a side business as a beer manufacturer!

In addition to the lovely Ms. Lorys, other eye candy is provided by Wandisa Guida and Luisa Rivelli. Another big laugh occurs early on when Ms. Lorys pops a cigarette in her mouth and all the guys present offer her a light.

Eisley is a studly, engaging hero, although modern viewers will either chuckle or wince at his casual sexism. In order to carry out the mission, Sennet must pose as a rich playboy, and you can tell he likes this kind of gig. At one point, he actually smacks the ass of this lady who's supposed to be his *boss*!

You add to that ninja-style costumes for the henchmen, amusing narration by Sennet, a fairly colourful visual approach for a movie done on the cheap & cheesy side, a decent forward pace, and a good amount of explosions, and you do have the ingredients for an agreeable Euro-spy schlock flick, all brought to life by the prolific director Antonio Margheriti.

Seven out of 10.

Six American moon launches in a row from Cape Canaveral have ended in catastrophe in the destroy button needing to be deployed in each case as the rockets were going off course and with the high cost of the destroyed hardware of the rockets . Dr. Rooney (Francisco Sanz) , part of the scientific team behind the launches, believes it is sabotage in having detected radiation signals coming from below the water's surface in the vicinity of the cape that is most-likely the cause of the rockets' change of trajectory. When Rooney himself goes missing in his investigation of the radiation source , the FSIC (Federal Security Investigation Commission) gets involved in knowing indeed that it is sabotage. Then a U. S. agent (Anthony Eisley) is assigned the mission and he goes undercover posing as a wealthy playboy to stop a madman (Folco Lulli) from destroying a NASA moon project. Just like his English counterpart (007) , our special agent to be surrounded by some beautiful female representatives (Wandisa Guida, Diana Lorys, Luisa Rivelli) and luckily , Italian genre cinema is an almost inexhaustible breeding ground for beauties of all kinds.

¨Lightning Bolt¨or ¨Operazione Goldman¨ (1966) belongs to ¨Eurospy" subgenre , under this somewhat barbaric Anglicism hides a series of films produced in Europe between 1962 and 1969 that tried to take advantage of the success of James Bond and especially : Dr No , From Russia with love and Goldfinger. One of the peculiarities of the "James Bond¨ rip-offs was wanting to imitate their model without ever having neither means , nor budget , turning to economy like most films of this sub-genre . Operation Goldman could have sunk into mediocrity or conformism , but it was without counting on this good artisan Antonio Margheriti that found the breeding ground here ideal to give us one of those uninhibited and fun movies that he had the secret of shooting with skill and professionality enough . The movie starts slowly like a conventional spy story , but once the hero is in the villain's underwater landmark , the director lets loose by recycling some ideas already exploited in his previous sci-fi movies like frozen humans , etc. The script is obviously just a pretext for Margheriti who does not hesitate to fit models and ideas of all kinds , which does not prevent him from abusing NASA stock footage , this is one of the weak points of this production, but the filmmaker once again demonstrates his incredible knowledge by integrating the explosion of models into real images. Unable the production to afford a designer of Ken Adam's importance , and the lack of budget does not prevent Margheritti from inventing some successful settings , as he cleverly uses some impressive scenarios , such as the large underwater headquarter, the villain's "high-tech" desk, protected by two giant articulated needles or the Italian Olympic team's training pool with a handful of bathing suit extras . In addition , he recreates a Florida hotel without ever leaving Spain or Italy where it was shot . Stars Anthony Eisley who was at the time one of the actors of a series that aired on ABC "Hawaiian Eye" (1959-1963). Subsequently, he also appeared in quite a few budget and genre films such as The Wasp Woman (1960), "The Navy vs. The Night Monsters" (1966), "The Mighty Gorga" (1969), The Witchmaker (1969), "Dracula vs Frankenstein" (1971) or "The Doll Squad" (1974). The film benefits itself from appearances by gorgeous young starlettes to be followed long careers in the Eurotrash genres , such as : Wandisa Guida, Diana Lorys and Luisa Rivelli . But here stands out the really gorgeous Diana Lorys , a Spanish female who has distinguished herself quite a bit in the spaghetti western: "The outlaws of Casa Grande" (1964), "I Gemelli del Texas" (1964), "The charge of the mounted police" (1964), "Murieta" ( 1965), "The border of hatred" (1965), "Django shoots first" (1966), "El texicano" (1966), "Pancho Villa" (1968), "Sonora" (1968), "Río Hondo" ( 1968), "Shoot Django First" (1971), The Four Mercenaries of El Paso (1971), "Chino" (1973), "Goodbye California" (1977), "The Cursed City" (1978) . While Wandisa Guida is a beauty who has distinguished herself in many films of the Sword and sandals genre: "The Revenge of Hercules", "The Rebellion of the Slaves", "The Revenge of Ursus", "The gladiators of Rome", "Maciste in King Solomon's mines", "The giants of Rome" ("Fort Alesia") or "Samson against all" and she will appear again in "A 077, Sfida ai Killers" and Operazione Goldman before stopping her career, making a final appearance in 1982 in "Assassinio al cimitero etrusco" ("Crime in the Etruscan Cemetery"). And being a Spain/Italy co-production showing up here and there some Spanish familiar actors , such as : Francisco Sanz , José María Caffarel , Tito Garcia , Fernando Hilbeck , Barta Barri and Italians : Folco Lulli , Aldo Canti , among others.

It contains a colorful cinematography by cameraman Riccardo Pallottini , though a perfect remastering being really necessary . Displaying a thrilling and moving musical score by Riz Ortalani. The motion picture was well produced by Alfonso Balcazar and professional but regularly directed by terror expert Antonio Margheritti or Anthony M. Dawson , though it displays some failures and shortcomings . Expert filmmaker Margheriti could not escape to shot Euro-spy films : after a series of science films fiction that will considerably strengthen his reputation over time, he continued with this spy genre : an adventure of Agent 077 aka Bob Fleming "A 077, Sfida ai Killers" with Richard Harrison and ¨Operazione Goldman¨, the latter largely inspired by Dr. No and Goldfinger. ¨Lightning Bolt¨ was directed by Stakhanovist Antonio Margheritti, who was responsible for one of the most bizarre and insane space operas ever made : ¨Wild, Wild Planet¨. He was one of the great Italian directors of the era, and has really attracted a cult following, but he made more than his share of half-way decent films in a number of different genres, and a few which are actually goofy enough to overcome their limitations. Antonio Margheritti was a good but uneven craftsman , expert on terror and exploitation films. Being a prestigious filmmaker of Spaghetti Westerns, terror , adventures Peplum and anything else . Notorious Antonio Margheritti directed with skillness and aplomb from 1956 to his death in 2002 . Antonio was a former university engineering student who began shooting in 1956. He made all kinds of genres , some of them splendidly directed and others mediocre or flops . As he realized wartime movies , such as : ¨The Last Hunter¨, ¨Tornado¨, ¨Codename Wild Geese¨, ¨Der Commander¨ , ¨Command Leopard¨ . Sci-Fi : ¨War of Planets¨, Planet of the Prowl¨ , ¨Criminal of the Galaxy¨ , ¨Yor the Hunter from the future¨ , ¨Treasure Planet¨ . Spaghetti Western : ¨Joko¨, ¨Dynamite Joe¨, ¨The Stranger and the Gunfighter¨, ¨Take a Hard Ride¨ , ¨Ghosts go West¨ , ¨Joe implacable¨, ¨God Said to Cain¨. And Terror : Virgin of Nuremberg , Cannibal Apocalypse , Alien From Deep , ¨Flesh for Dracula¨ , ¨Flesh for Frankenstein¨, among others. Rating 5.5/10. Mediocre but passable for the enjoyable cast and adequate direction . The picture will appeal to Euro-spy aficionados.

The Plot. A U.S. agent goes undercover as a rich playboy to stop a madman from destroying a NASA moon project. I saw this under the title of Lightning Bolt.

Made in Italy and Spain, this 1966 movie takes it's plot from the James Bond / spy craze of the 60s, with a bit of NASA space work thrown in to make it interesting.

It is by no means a great movie, however I can see how this could be fun as a midnite grind-house screening. It's wide screen and technicolor and there are relatively decent special effects. There's also some fun 60's misogyny.

What brings the experience down a notch is that it seems like the whole movie is dubbed even though they are speaking English. It gives the film a cheaper feeling.

A lot of the sets look very Bond-ish. The acting and directing is a few notches above most cheap-o Italian movies. Although it's a bit slow paced.

This movie is a lot of fun with multiple plot twists and a bad guy with a hilarious German accent. If you like SciFi or Eurospy take a little time and enjoy Operation Goldman.

This is one cheesy movie and a lot has been written about it (mostly bad) since it is widely available on the gray market but there are things (mostly bad, again) worth mentioning.

Lightning Bolt features smart-ass hard-boiled narration by Eisley and many moments of unintentionally laughable dialog, the kind that would make Ed Wood proud. Nonsensical situations and actions abound in this movie and the special effects are as to be expected; not very special, like the old yarn-for-the-laser-beam trick made famous in Italy.

Though the movie has a few charms they are outweighed by too much silliness, a weak villain and the sense that one's time is worth more than the budget spent in making it.