Agent poker

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Movie
German title Agent poker
Original title Hopscotch
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 1980
length 106 minutes
Rod
Director Ronald Neame
script Brian Garfield ,
Bryan Forbes
production Otto Plaschkes ,
Edie Landau ,
Ely A. Landau
music Ian Fraser
camera Arthur Ibbetson ,
Brian W. Roy
cut Carl Kress
occupation

Agent Poker is an American agent comedy from 1980 starring Walter Matthau and Glenda Jackson . The alternative title is Bluff Poker - Ein Schlitzohr unpacks , another title is Hopscotch - Der Aussteiger .

The film is based on the 1975 novel Hopscotch by Brian Garfield.

action

After 20 years as a CIA - Agent in the field Miles Kendig should be put into the archive. But the old hand can not be pushed away so easily by his new boss Myerson. Instead of taking care of the old files, he disappears to enjoy the time in Salzburg with his lover, the widowed, former secret service employee Isobel von Schönenburg, and to write a book about the machinations of the secret services .

Kendig sends the text of the first chapter to the most important secret services in the world. When the first reading samples arrive in Washington, the angry Myerson puts agents Cutter and Ross on the traitor. But Kendig fools his pursuers and lures them around the world in a cat-and-mouse game - it goes from Austria via Switzerland and France back to the USA and via Bermuda on to London.

In London, Kendig has found a courageous publisher in Parker Westlake who is ready to publish the explosive book. The secret service people follow Kendig to the Channel coast and witness how his getaway plane explodes right outside Beachy Head after being shot at Myerson . The Kendig case appears to be closed. But this time too, Kendig fooled everyone. In the final shot you see him, disguised as an Indian, chatting with a clerk in a London bookshop about the bestseller Hopscotch .

Reviews

For the lexicon of international film, it was a "witty and for the most part peppy agent comedy, which emphasizes the action-packed side of this profession, but provides relaxing entertainment with a brilliant leading actor and surprising changes in tempo".

music

In the film, many pieces by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart are used as musical accompaniment. Worth mentioning are the aria Non Più Andrai from the opera Die Hochzeit des Figaro , the Andante from Eine kleine Nachtmusik , the first movement of the piano sonata No. 11 (best known for its third movement Rondo alla Turca / Turkish March ) and the Rondo in D major ( KV 382 ), which served as a musical symbolization of typewriting.

Hermann Prey's powerful interpretation of the aria Non Più Andrai underlines the absurd age of a double-decker that Myerson is shooting at. The aria depicts that Cherubino ("little baby"), after taking up officer service, is no longer the Countess' darling, just as Myerson is slowly but surely losing his influence at the CIA.

The aria Largo al Factotum from the opera Il barbiere di Siviglia by Gioachino Rossini can also be heard . Walter Matthau sings it when he passes a border checkpoint. The text of the aria explains how everyone looks for the barber. Matthau, who is wanted by the entire CIA in the film, moves across the border at lightning speed. Some scenes are also accompanied by the 15th century French folk song " Sur le pont d'Avignon ".

Matthau, a great lover of operas, said he picked the pieces for the film himself.

particularities

Walter Matthaus' son David plays the role of Leonard Ross.

In addition to locations in the United States ( Atlanta and Savannah ) and Great Britain ( East Sussex , London and London Heathrow Airport ), the film was also shot in Munich and Salzburg .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Agent Poker. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used 
  2. ^ The Internet Movie Base
  3. ^ The Internet Movie Base - Locations