Overview: Anarchy reigns as Diana Rigg and Oliver Reed go head to head in a blackly comic caper that plays out against the colorful backdrop of Europe on the cusp of World War One.

London, 1908. When feisty journalist and women’s rights campaigner Sonia Winter (Diana Rigg) uncovers the headquarters of the Assassination Bureau Limited, a clandestine enterprise that has existed for decades by bumping off the rich and powerful – but only if there’s a good moral reason for it – she sets on a path of putting an end to its activities.

Bankrolled by her press baron boss, Lord Bostwick (Telly Savalas), she commissions the organization to undertake the assassination of its very own chairman, Ivan Dragomiloff (Oliver Reed). Being the gentleman that he is, Dragomiloff responds to the assignment with glee, challenging his fellow board members to complete the contract.

Only they’ll have to catch him first!

Blu-ray Verdict: Oliver Reed stars as the unlikely-monikered Ivan Dragomiloff, the head of an international (though wholly European) bureau of assassins (hence the title) who will kill anyone for the right price. When investigative journalist Sonya Winter (Diana Rigg) shows up at his doorstep asking him agency to accept a contract to kill him, the game, as they say, is afoot.

Now, in all truth, the movie doesn’t take itself seriously and you shouldn’t either. The arch dialogue - sounding like something from an off-off-off-Broadway play - is preposterous but fun, and Reed and Rigg twist their tongues around such ludicrous tongue twisters that by fifteen minutes into the film you’re primarily laughing at the movie, albeit, and perhaps, not always with it.

But it’s also fun to watch two pros spar with one another with such purple prose, and everyone else in the film - even Savalas (TV’s Kojak) - is along for the ride, playing racial stereotypes and accents to the hilt (the film is, after all, nearly 55 years old). Adding to the laughs are overdone costumes; set in the years just prior to WWI, Rigg spends most of the movie in Gibson Girl get-up, while Reed moves from one overdone suit to the next.

The plot is actually a pretty good idea and I could see a remake of this film being done (hopefully with a more contemporary setting), though that would lose you the most rib-tickling part of all, a long fight scene atop a creaky zeppelin between Reed and Savalas and his cronies.

Reed here is sharp and funny - I hadn’t realized he had a gift for comedy like this - and he’s also remarkably handsome and lean (my strongest memories of him are playing Bill Sykes in Oliver and Athos in the good Musketeer movies, both shabby characters).

Reed, in fact, comes off as Johnny Depp’s cinematic predecessor, giving a crisp, precise but offbeat performance. Rigg is howlingly miscast as the young Miss Winter (she was 31 when she made the film), a tee-totaller straight-lace who, predictably, eventually comes around; but her wonderfully expressive face is put to good use here, and hey, Diana Rigg in a gunny sack is still a sexy Diana Rigg!

I won’t say much about Savalas - cast as a sort of English William Randolph Hearst - because I find he played one character no matter who it was, and you either like his uni-role acting style or you don’t. It was, however, nice to see Clive Revill hamming it up as an Italian count, and a host of B-actors from the Avengers (most notably Warren Mitchell, who at 80, was still working and in mighty fine form); all of them manage to understand perfectly the tongue-in-cheek tone of the film and seem perfectly at home.

In closing, this movie will probably play as overly silly to most modern audiences, though it is lighthearted fun, but any fans of Rigg or Reed or even slightly campy comedies should most definitely give this one a long, hard look.

High Definition (1080p) Blu-ray presentation
Original lossless English mono audio
Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing
Brand new audio commentary with authors Sean Hogan and Kim Newman
Right Film, Wrong Time, a 30-minute appreciation by critic, broadcaster and cultural historian Matthew Sweet
Original trailer
Image gallery
Reversible sleeve featuring two original artwork choices

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