"The Executioner" opens in an unusual (especially for its time) fashion: with the aftermath of a violent action sequence which will only be seen near the end of the movie; then the story leading up to this is told in long flashbacks. It's a serious, dark spy thriller with lots and lots of plot twists; there is one character who may be a double, a triple, or even a quadruple agent! The main hero, well played by George Peppard, is not a cut-and-dried good guy; in fact, it is suggested that he often lets his feelings cloud his judgment. The supporting cast (yes, even Joan Collins!) is also very good, and Judy Geeson shines as Peppard's quirky, supportive girlfriend. The locations include London, Istanbul, Athens and Corfu, but they're not meant to be glamorous, they're just part of the exhaustive and exhausting spy business. An undeservedly neglected film. *** out of 4.
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Espionage dramas which depend on bureaucratic characters engaged in prolonged conversations rarely make good movies and this is no exception. It's competent but never sparks any real interest and the plot seems a bit muddled.
There are a number of good names in the cast and they do the best they can with pedestrian material. Top billing goes to George Peppard who plays an Englishman but his American accent is explained by saying that he grew up in the United States. He's involved, in a vaguely romantic way, with two different women -- Joan Collins and Judy Geeson -- but not much comes of this. The ads hint at some hot bedroom action between Peppard and Collins but most of these scenes must have been left on the cutting room floor.
Location work in Greece and Istanbul is, like the rest of the movie, strictly routine. -
Jason K3 September 1999A dour little spy thriller which acts as a corrective to the James Bond school of spy movies, and benefits from an excellent performance by George Peppard as an exhausted, stressed out Ango-US agent searching for a mole in British Intelligence (just the one?). The atmosphere of post-swinging London is interesting from a modern standpoint, as is the unusual flashback plot structure.
Trivia for Gerry Anderson fans: Both Paul Maxwell (the voice of Steve Zodiac in Fireball XL5) and Peter Dyneley (the voice of Jeff Tracy in Thunderbirds) have quite major roles in The Executioner. -
jmol26 September 2004Deep in plot factors and to some perhaps slow in development (but layered spy films need to "develop" to set the story in play). But steeped in cold war motivations and sensibilities of the time. Peppard is driven to do his job well, with concern for protecting those things and people he values. Twists and turns confront him, but he resolves the factors. But then there is that final and jaw-dropping question which is the final line of the film!
His former controller offers him a position of command within the British espionage structure from which George Peppard has left. Disgusted with the way in which the prior situation was handled (set up by his overseers) Peppard might be presumed to say NO, but my presumption is that the answer would have been YES.
Watch the film and screw your head on tight, no exits to bathroom without pause button pushed, this is not a trivial action film. -
bsmith555220 August 2019"The Executioner" is yet another spy drama with George Peppard donning the trench coat. He is supposed to be a British national who left England at an earlier age and was raised in the USA before returning to serve his country. This explains, if you will, his American accent.
Peppard plays John Shay who has detected a "leak" at the top echelons of British Intelligence. He suspects fellow agent Adam Booth (Keith Mitchell) as being the culprit and sets out to prove it. Booth is marries to Shay's former lover Sarah Booth (Joan Collins) while shay is in a relationship with the pert young Polly Bendel (Judy Geeson).
Shay pleads with his superiors, Vaughn Jones (Charles Gray) and Colonel Scott (Nigel Patrick) even to the point of forcing an inquiry into the matter. The inquiry vindicates Booth but Shay carries on. He travels to Greece and Turkey to gain evidence. He meets Russian defector Racovsky (Oskar Homolka) at the American Embassy in Greece who gives him the impression that Booth is indeed a double agent.
One night, back in England, Shay is awakened by a phone call from his friend Philip Crawford (George Baker) who tells him that he has discovered Booth going through secret documents on his desk. Crawford you see, is also enamored by the beautiful Sarah. Shay, now having no doubt about Boot's guilt takes him into the countryside and kills him.
Later Shay goes to Turkey in place of Booth who was supposed to go. He travels with Sarah was to accompany her husband. In Turkey Shay is taken by the Russians who inform Shay that Booth was not their agent and that they were intending to rub him out. Shay is devastated that he has killed an innocent man. The Russians have also taken Sarah prisoner and want to exchange her for Crawford who is a scientist working on the Space Program on behalf of the Americans.
As the exchange is taking place................................................................................
The all British cast, except for Peppard. is excellent as always. Collins is as beautiful as ever and Geeson is a little flighty as Shay's current squeeze. Character actors Gray and Patrick stand out as Shay's superiors as does Mitchell as Booth. Homolka does what he can with what amounts to a cameo role.
And oh yes, wait for the surprise ending. -
Coventry17 May 2017Severe and merciless penalties should be given to people who dare to write a screenplay that is titled "The Executioner" and then subsequently deliver a film that is indescribably boring and almost doesn't contain any action whatsoever; let alone executions! I read in a few reviews that this is the more intelligent espionage thriller You know, the type of film that gives realistic insights in the true world of secret agents rather than the contemporary James Bond movies that were all about stunts, flamboyance and gadgetry. Well, it may or may not be true that "The Executioner" is realistic but it's certainly NOT entertaining and certainly NOT the least bit memorable, unlike the vast majority of James Bond episodes. To make things even worse: the movie starts out extremely promising, with Peppard strolling around in the garden of a luxurious villa where just a bloody massacre took place. There are bloodied corpses left, right and at the bottom of the pool. Unfortunately, the boring 100 minutes that follow are a giant flashback clarifying the building up towards this massacre. American actor George Peppard depicts British secret agent John Shay. He explains at least a dozen times that his Yankee accent comes from the fact that he was raised in America. Shay suspects that his colleague Adam Booth is a double- agent who betrays the Queen by passing secret information to the Russians. Shay's superiors don't believe him, or perhaps they are protecting Booth, and he even gets suspended. Shay remains certain that he's right and seeks for further evidence in Greece, although it may also just be that he's jealous, because Booth is married to the beautiful Sarah with whom Shay once had an affair. "The Executioner" is a long – seemingly endless, in fact – and dreadfully tedious series of pointless dialogues and newly introduced characters of which you don't know who they are and why they are relevant to the plot. There isn't any suspense or mystery, and you don't feel the least bit connected with any of the lead characters, especially John Shay because he behaves like an arrogant and stubborn little boy. I was never a big fan of George Peppard, apart from his roles in the movies "Damnation Alley" and "Race for the Yankee Zephyr". His performance here is one of the most monotonous and indifferent I've ever seen. I can't write anything positive about "The Executioner", except that Judy Geeson is cute and that it's always a pleasure to watch Charles Gray (although his role is immensely dull as well)
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udar5523 November 2008Brit-born, American-raised spy John Shay (Peppard) is dismayed when his undercover operation in Germany goes belly up. On suspension by his superiors, he begins to sense there is a double agent in the mix and believes it is Adam Booth (Keith Michell), a top agent loved by the brass who also happens to be married to Shay's ex Sarah (Joan Collins). The further he digs, the more Shay is convinced that Booth is feeding info to the Russians.
Steeped in a far more realistic world of espionage than the Bond series, this George Peppard vehicle is semi-dull and semi-great. The first hour relies too much on Peppard getting stern talks from his superiors. It doesn't help matters that Shay is quite a chauvinist, shown treating Sarah and current squeeze Polly (Judy Geeson) terribly. Peppard certainly has an on screen presence though. The last 45-minutes redeem the film with a memorable twist (which is, sadly, undermined by a coda that one should ignore if cynical like me) and some great location shooting in Turkey and Greece. Charles Gray (Blofeld in DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER) plays one of Shay's superiors. -
Sam Wanamaker did a very good job of directing this excellent Cold War spy drama, back in the days when no one imagined the Cold War would ever end. The story is essentially British, so the excuse for using the American star George Peppard in the lead is that 'he grew up in America', hence has the accent. Peppard was always good in these parts as the good guy struggling against the forces of darkness, whether Nazis or Communists. He is romantically involved with the popular ingénue actress of the day, Judy Geeson. Sam must have thought she looked a bit too cute in real life, so he stuck some studious spectacles on her face to give her a bit of gravitas. Judy really was extremely cute, and a very sweet-natured person as well. I met her back then along with her parents and sister, and what a 'cute clan' they all were. They were great art lovers and liked to go to private views, which is how I met them all together like that. They had a particular favourite artist whom they always patronised, but I can't remember who he was. Judy's greatest asset was that lovely look around her eyes, which made her such an irresistible sight for any camera, or any fellow, for that matter. Good old Oscar Homolka is here called upon for the n-th time to play a defecting Russian spy, and does even better than usual. Joan Collins does a good job of acting, playing a difficult and amorous ex-lover (type casting?), and generally Sam could be said to get the best out of his actors because he was one himself, so he knew how to treat them and understood the pressures they were under. This is a rollicking good tale of the times, not as sophisticated and profound as le Carré of course, then then who was? There are the usual deceptions, twists, double-crosses and triple-crosses, all good stuff.
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drystyx29 October 20141970 was about the time that spy movies became nonsense, as this one shows.
Nonsense was in earlier movies. A lot of noir movies were based on this. No plot, no motivation, no story, just one liners and writers contriving excuses to kill people in a movie for no reason, and then claim there was a reason.
That's pretty much what happens in this spy movie. George Peppard suspects the husband of a girl he loves to be a spy. We have no idea why, and we have no idea why the characters in the spy ring do what they do. Merely for effect. Once you get past this, that the plot doesn't exist and there is no motivation, the rest is easier to watch.
It is full of almost every spy cliché there is, and these were already clichés well before 1970.
The "personal" motivations of private lives plays out better than the "plot" angle, and that's what you would watch this one for. -
Dr_Mark_ODoherty2 June 2020I liked this film; because even though the film is 50 years old, the picture provides a very interesting and vivid panorama of people and society during the Cold War.
I think this film also depicts very well the intellectual clash between Western- and Soviet Intelligence during the Cold War; both sides being guilty of unscrupulous and unethical conduct, by using innocent people as pawns to further their own respective agendas. On the other hand, these negative policies by Intelligence Agencies during the Cold War probably also helped a bit to avoid another world war; conventional diplomacy having failed between the West and the Soviet Union during that time - before the Cold War ended and the Iron Curtain was finally lifted. Regrettably though, it would seem that those times are not quite over yet. Although spies and diplomats are much more gently disposed and peace loving than in the Cold War; there is still some work to do concerning International Peacebuilding and diplomacy. Hence we should do everything in our power to make sure that human rights are no longer infringed upon; and to convince British, American, Russian, French, German and Chinese Intelligence agencies - and all other Intelligence Agencies in the world - to get those rogue factions from the International Intelligence Community in line, so that human rights can fully be upheld - and that all intelligence agencies in the world finally make peace with each other, so that the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) can be manifested in the International Community.
On another note, I think this film shows very well that gender issues are very much a topic in the intelligence community. In this film the British MI5 agent John Shay (George Peppard) suspects a colleague of his to be a double agent, who happens to be the husband of a girl he loves - and this causes all kinds of problems in the close-knit MI5 intelligence community; with three highly trained British agents wanting to have a romantic relationship with the kind and lovely Sarah; played by Joan Collins. As it turns out, Sarah is a bit of a Femme fatale; having a bit of fun with MI5 agents - perhaps because out of boredom, or perhaps because Sarah is not as kind and lovely as she appears to be, having some unresolved psychological issues - even though she is not a Russian spy, but just a misguided soul, lacking the mystic power to manifest joy, love and harmony in her life.
In short, this is a great film with a remarkable resemblance of today's world; highlighting human frailties in the Intelligence Community - of yesterday and today :) -
andrenalin_048 February 2011British Intelligence agent John Shay suspects that a security leak caused the collapse of British operations in Vienna. He persuades his girl friend Polly, a secretary at Intelligence headquarters, to allow him access to secret files. The information leads Shay to suspect fellow agent Adam Booth (whose wife, Sarah, has been having an affair with him) of being a double agent for the Soviet Union. Although Shay denounces Booth, his superiors refuse to act on what they believe to be groundless charges, and Shay is suspended from his duties for obtaining the confidential files. Nevertheless, he goes to Istanbul to search for more evidence against Booth; while he is investigating, an attempt is made on his life. With conclusive information from British scientist Philip Crawford, who is also involved with Sarah, Shay then murders Booth and finds a plane ticket to Athens in his pocket. Shay boards the plane, accompanied by Sarah, who is unaware of her husband's death. In Athens, where Shay impersonates Booth, they are captured by Soviet agents and held for an exchange for Crawford. Colonel Scott, CIA agent, rescues Shay and Sarah and reveals that Booth was indeed a double agent being used by the British to transmit false information to the Russians.
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SoftKitten806 December 2004Unremarkable B British movie. I don't know if it is the director or the acting, but there is no energy in it. It is watchable (once). You can see a glimmer of the charisma Joan Collins can bring to a nighttime soap opera. The blonde girl was a bit whiny for my taste. The dresses for she and Joan Collins were outstanding. I saw a blue number I wouldn't mind wearing myself. The movie had potential, if in the right hands. It was relatively painless, but kind of flat. You didn't feel you were at the Parthenon even though they splurged on location shooting. The movie cover looks far more exciting than the movie itself. There were areas where there should have been music to set the mood, but there was silence. In the proper hands this movie could have been a classic.