Midnight in St. Petersburg

It's hard to believe that Michael Caine would have affiliated with so poorly done a film, but there he is, all grins and deer in the headlights stare. The film, which was produced for Showtime, has the episodic pacing of a TV series pilot, marred by an average cast struggling with a sub-average script. The thin plot line about missing plutonium and a suspected art heist is filled out with endless shots of the most touristic sights of St. Petersburg, including two rival, and not very competent, gangs of the Russian mafia. It's fun for the scenery up to a point, but cliched to a frightening degree. Caine is good even when he's bad, but this is as lackluster as I have ever seen him.

A movie in which the main characters show why they're well regarded actors and serve to show up the remainder of the cast who deliver wooden performances with clichéd dialogue. Shame on you Michaels Caine and Gambon for taking on such a woeful movie. Were you looking for the rent money that week? The plot is, at best, hackneyed standard spy stuff and any plot twists feel forced and pointless. The main premise of an art heist from the Hermitage is barely believable and plays to the stereotype of the corrupt Russian gangsters a bit too heavily. If you ever think a couple of hours could be well spent watching this movie, think again. Go do your hair, watch the fish moult or weed the cat! Just don't watch this movie for your sanity's sake.

All that's missing from the script is a big flashing light on the screen every time an important plot point is mentioned. Probably the worst script Michael Caines ever worked with and he'd just done Bullet to Beijing. Fortunately the direction's nearly as bad, but you still feel some sympathy for the actors, if not the characters. Still you will know that the Russian for Thankyou is spaseeba, it seems to be added to the end of every English sentence. Michael Caine's as watchable as ever but Harry Palmer should have stopped with Billion Dollar Brain, as sequels go this is slightly less worthwhile than the science.

All that needs to be said is do not try reliving the good times if of the past....it's never as good...and so it goes with movies. IPCRESS, Funeral in Berlin and to a lesser degree Billion Dollar Brain were masterpieces of their time. This and Bullet to Beijing are mediocre straight to video type films...nice workmanlike films...but you can never recapture past glories. I hope that Harrison Ford takes this on board when he thinks of reprising Indiana Jones..

Slightly better than better than Bullet to Beijing, this fifth installment of the Harry Palmer series of films is no match for the first two. Being a TV movie you just don't get the same action or suspense of a proper cinematic movie and Caine is just going through the motions. Connery is ok as Nick and the rest of the cast are passable to, but that's the main problem of a film about stolen art and plutonium. It's just not exciting enough. On the plus side at under 90 minutes the film doesn't outstay it's welcome.

Every time I woke up during this film there seemed to be Caine jumping in a car and rushing off somewhere.If it was trying to capture the magic of the first three Palmer films then it failed miserably,not just because they were the product of a different time and atmosphere, but because its a muddle to a point I really didn't have a clue what was going on, just a lot of cars buzzing about,old factories and the usual rat-tat-tat dialogue. While Caine was hungry for the fame in the first Palmer pictures and acted accordingly, he is not hungry anymore here and is obviously just Michael Caine acting as Michael Caine, but its not all his fault as he has no foil here to bounce off due to the dull co-stars.

This sequal to bullet to beijing was ok. I don't feel like it was as good as that film and there was not enough memorable pieces to it. Its a film that didn't really need to be a sequal and almost worked better as a standalone, if it was not for the returning characters. I also felt we needed more gambon as he was not all that featured in this. The plot about finding missing plutonium was a little watered down and never really went anywhere. But the cast were all still good and once again it was enjoyable to see caine back at it for the last time as palmer and probably for the best as well as the character is a little worn out now. Overall not as great as the other movie and almost not a good end to what was otherwise a pretty good series.

Bullet To Beijing and Midnight in Saint Petersburg were Harry Palmer films that were made back to back. Both were rather awful and really did not have the feel of the 1960s Harry Palmer films. Harry Palmer (Michael Caine) has set up a private investigation agency in Russia with Nick Petrov (Jason Connery) and the ex CIA Agent Craig. They have been hired to locate some missing plutonium. Nick is detoured to find his missing girlfriend who has been abducted. Her father is a curator in a museum with valuable artwork. Somehow both stories merge. Once again, rival gangsters from Bullet To Beijing involved. There are double crosses and an easy to spot mole. Thankfully a character at the end of this movie explains the plot. Art for cash. Then cash for plutonium. There are nice location shots of Saint Petersburg. Apart from that it looks rather cheap, the script is bad and it did not remind of anything from the pen of Len Deighton.

Caine's return to the Harry Palmer character in BULLET TO BEIJING seemed to the beginning of a new series. Complex and amusing, it had novelty and Caine's great performance. Now comes the sequel and it seems a bit of a retread of the first film. I would guess they were shot back-to-back because of the re-use of many characters and sets.This one replaces biological warfare with Plutonium as the evil substance and features no prolonged train trips. The plot is not too surprising and the secret double agent easy to spot. Too bad they could not have tried again. Maybe filming HORSE UNDER WATER ( updated) might have been fun.

God help us! Another continuity faux-pas. In the scene of Connery greeting General Kornikov,he says he has been in Russia before and answers the General with "Very pleased (to meet you)". Nothing wrong with the words(in Russian) but they would make any Russian language student cringe - talk about butcher the language. Later, "Tatiana's" father walks across a bridge followed by Connery in a Volvo, ostensibly from the Hermitage - except that he's walking toward Nevskii Prospekt, not away ( I don't know, maybe I misunderstood the scene). Still, it's the worst example of Russian gangsterism versuses the spy world ever made. Want reality, try going there and trying to find someone to trust.