Cloak and Dagger

Calling all of you Top-secret Agents and Spies! 

Whilst sorting through all the clutter here at HQ, I found some old movies that I'm going to talk about sooner or later here on the blog.  I thought I'd start with a neat little "kid's movie" from 1984 called "Cloak and Dagger."

Fair warning:  I did not re-watch the movie for this entry; I'm going strictly off of memory here, so please bear with me.  

I first saw this movie in grade school.  I'm talking, like 4th, maybe 5th grade.  I don't remember why they were showing it.  It must have been the last day of school before some vacation or the end of the year or something.  I just remember it was extremely cool, and I was SO excited when I found it months/years later on...HBO or something.

The movie stars Henry Thomas, or as I knew him at the time, the kid from the E.T. movie.  Here, he plays Davey Osborne.  Davey lives in San Antonio, Texas, with his father Hal, who is an air traffic controller and played by Dabney Coleman!  I'm used to Dabney Coleman playing some sort of antagonistic role, and I guess he kind of is in this movie, too.

See, Davey's Mom passed away before the start of the movie, and now Hal and Davey have trouble relating to one another.  Davey seeks refuge in a role-playing game called "Cloak and Dagger," a very James Bond-inspired espionage game.  His main character is a super-spy named Jack Flack, who Davey also talks to as an imaginary friend.  In Davey's imagination, Jack Flack is modeled after his own father and is also played by Dabney Coleman.

Davey mostly plays Cloak and Dagger with his friend Kim, a girl around his age, who hangs out with him because he's not "boring like all the other boys are."  He also plays with his friend Morris, who owns a game shop in the mall.  

Morris sends the kids on a "real life" mission to obtain some catalogs from Textronics for him.  So armed with his water pistol (filled with red ink), a softball (to stand in for a grenade), and a pair of walkie-talkies, Davey and Kim go to achieve their objective.

In the office building where Textronics is located, Davey is "in character," running from pillar to pillar, must to Kim's embarrassment.  They split up, and Kim takes the elevator while Davey takes the stairs.  

Davey pauses at a window in the stairwell and notices the windows of the next building are acting as mirrors, and he can see what's going on in an office on the floor above him.  He sees one man shoot another man.  Then the shooting victim stumbles into the stairwell, gives Davey a copy of the Cloak and Dagger Atari cartridge loaded with military secrets, and instructs him to deliver it to the FBI.

He runs out of the stairwell screaming Bloody Murder, and although the security guards are skeptical, they investigate--and find an EMPTY stairwell!  Meanwhile, the murderer found Davey's softball...with his name clearly printed upon it.

Over the next few days, Davey is drawn into a game of cat-and-mouse with these murderers and spies who chase him down to get the cartridge back.  He, in turn, learns of their drop-off point at the Alamo and intercepts the game cartridge before the pick-up is made.  Kim gets kidnapped, the murderers hunt down Davey along the River Walk, and spies kidnap Davey and hijack a plane!

It's a wild ride!  Nobody believes Davey (until it's far too late, of course!), and his only reliable help through most of the movie is Kim, who is also skeptical for half the film, and his imaginary companion, Jack Flack, who wants to play a much more violent game than Davey is willing to play.

I once read somewhere (may on Wikipedia, I forget) that the director claimed he wanted to make a suspenseful Hitchcock-style film but for kids.  I'd say he hit his mark!  

In case you couldn't tell, I love this movie!  I think it's great!  A lot of fun to watch!  It seemed really relatable when I first saw it back in school.  I have this on DVD, and I do re-watch it every once in a while.  I heartily recommend it to anyone who likes a good adventure!

It is available to rent on Amazon Prime Video, but you'd probably have to check bargain bins and eBay if you wanted a VHS or maybe even a DVD.  But I'm sure they must be available somewhere! 

What about you, have you seen it?  If so, tell us your opinions in the comments below!  Meanwhile, I have to decide just what lost treasure to discuss in the next post...

Until then, I wish you all...

Good Adventuring!
Timothy A. Sayell

Once Upon A Spy

Hello to all my Trenchcoat Adorned Spies! 

Hey, you remember a few blog posts back I was talking about various spy shows and movies?  Well, I stumbled across a one I'd never heard of before and I'm gonna tell you about it!

I was on YouTube one day, just minding my own business, when suddenly this video suggestion pops up.  It's a movie from 1980 called "Once Upon A Spy" and it stars Ted Danson (before he got on "Cheers") and Christopher Lee (long after he was Dracula for Hammer Pictures).  Apparently this was a TV movie-of-the-week, and was intended as the pilot to a proposed series, though I'm not 100% sure about this.

So get this...Christopher Lee is an evil genius (naturally!) who wants to take over the world.  He sends in an elite team to steal this super-computer from NASA...and I mean one of those old fashioned early computers that takes up the entire wall of a building!  Remember, this was back before there was any such thing as a personal computer.  Anyway, they crash into the NASA building with a semi truck and blast the computer with a mysterious laser beam.

So the government...they don't really define which agency...brings in Ted Danson as Jack Chenault, a government computer programmer to go talk to the scientist who built the super-computer and to investigate the scene of he crime.  All escorted with by an actual field agent, of course!

The field agent is Paige Tannehill, played by Mary Louise Weller, an attractive blonde best best known for appearing in the movie "Animal House".  You know how these things go, first they don't get along, but are practically dating by the end of the movie.  They tried to have snappy banter...and...well, let's just say they tried.

They arrive in time to find the scientist and his daughter get kidnapped by the bad guy's henchmen and give chase...until a helicopter uses a magnet to pick up thee bad guys car and take them away.  

They investigate the scene of the crime and deduce that the computer was shrunk, which leads them to the villain, Marcus Valorium, played by Christopher Lee in a nifty space-age wheelchair, complete with firing missiles!  He remembers Chenault as the only man who ever beat him...several years ago when they were competing for some science award.  

So, Chenault figures out that with the NASA computer to connect him to satellites (and the computer's creator to operate the now-miniature computer--apparently he can re-enlarge an object once it's been shrunk), Valorium can bounce his shrink ray to just about anywhere in the world. And although Chenault insists that he is NOT a field agent, he keeps volunteering for missions partly due to his expertise, partly due to his personal connection to the bad guy, and partly due to the feelings he's developing for Tannehill.  

So Chenault goes to see Valorium and confirms that he is behind the theft.  He goes with Tannehill to parachute to Valorium's observatory hide-out to rescue the professor & her daughter...and also to help destroy the shrink ray, of course.

But they get captured, and the girl gets dropped into a trippy mirror-walled maze that Chenault must guide her through, avoiding the two hit men Valorium is guiding to take her out.  It's a weird, sick game that Valorium wants to play to prove he's better then Chenault, cuz the guy holds a grudge.

All in all, "Once Upon A Spy" is kind of a James Bond wannabe.  It's not too bad, but far from excellent.  What they were attempting isn't bad, but you can see that it lacked some vital spark, and it's really no wonder the series wasn't picked up.  This reminds me of movies that I watched as a kid and thought were great, then grew up and rewatched and found out they were horrible.  ...Maybe it would be ok for a preteen audience? *shrug*

If you can't find anything better, this could help you pass and hour-and-a-half.  I don't recommend paying for it, though.  If you want to watch it, find it streaming somewhere for free!  Like I said, I found it on YouTube, so watch it there! ...Or don't!   

Well, that's all for now!  I'll see ya next time!

Until then, I wish you all...

Good Adventuring!
Timothy A. Sayell

Totally Admirable Spies! Part One

 Howdy you Truly Adventurous Souls!

Well, life goes on and I hope it's treating you well, and that you're ready for more adventure!  I know I am!  And we're in luck because, as I've said before, adventure comes in all shapes and sizes!  Today I'd like to ramble on about spies...so I will!

Now, I'm not here to talk about real life spies.  I'm sure they have very exciting and adventurous moments, but my understanding of real life spies is that most of it is actually very tedious and boring.  So we're going to talk about spies in fiction who, generally and theoretically speaking, have more excitement in their lives.

Spies and secret agents have inhabited fiction...probably for as long as there have been fiction stories!  Well, I'm just going to Talk About Some, and in no particular order.  

I've got to start someplace, so I'll start with old pulp magazines.  There were all sorts of spies in those old pulps!  There were several spies in the old pulps.  Operator #5 is the most obvious example.  He was an American agent with a sword hidden in his belt who fought against oppressive foreign powers.  His magazine featured a 13 issue story arc called "The Purple Invasion", an interconnected epic written by Emile C. Tepperman, which is considered by aficionados to be the "War and Peace" of pulp stories!

G-8 was a heroic aviator and spy during World War One and had 110 issues of his own magazine, "G-8 and his Battle Aces".  He constantly fought against Herr Doktor Krueger and the Steel Mask and their many schemes which involved weird scientific devices or supernatural elements.  You want WWI biplanes Vs Giant Bats or a whole squadron of Zombie Pilots?  G-8 fought them!

Secret Agent X (from the magazine of the same name) started off as an agent who worked for a group of anonymous millionaires who funded his missions, but eventually he became a government agent.  He was ALWAYS in disguise, and even his own allies never saw his true face!  He usually dealt in crime right here in America, but always tinged with sci-fi elements like super weapons or mad scientists.  Not only was he the man with 1,000 faces, but he was armed with a gas gun that put his foes to sleep! 

Kerrigan, Murdock, and Klaw were better known as The Suicide Squad who featured in "Ace G-Man Stories".  This trio of FBI agents were the best of the best of the best!  Whenever the FBI had a job that could NOT be done they called up these guys.  This team took on every suicide mission the FBI could find, and always came back for more!

Secret Agent X-9 (not to be confused with Secret Agent X above) was a newspaper comic strip originally written by Dashiell Hammett (author of "The Maltese Falcon" and creator of Sam Spade) and drawn by Alex Raymond (creator of Flash Gordon)!  Is that heck of a pedigree, or what?  Of course, these duties were eventually taken up by other writers and artists.  But Secret Agent X-9 was pretty popular, even got to star in two different serials!

Spy Smasher was a comic book hero, a "wealthy Virginia sportsman" who was also a skilled detective armed with a wide array of gadgets and specialty vehicles.  Sort of like Batman, but before Batman.  I think technically Spy Smasher was a super-detective (again, like Batman) but he often fought against an enemy spy ring led by a figure known as The Mask, and got a LOT of government intel from his fiance's father, who was a high ranking Navy Admiral.  Spy Smasher also got his own serial.

Dick Barton--Special Agent started off as a radio show presented in 15 minute episodes, but was also a trio of films by Hammer studios, and a television show, and even a stage play!  Dick Barton and his trusty sidekicks fought against Nazis who wanted to poison Britain's water supply, and spy rings that tried to take over England with an army of psychopathic criminals.  He rescued kidnapped scientists and dismantled death rays all for Queen and country!

Secret Service agent Jim West and Artemis Gordon patrolled "The Wild Wild West" and battled a wide array of mad scientists and supernatural threats on behalf of President Ulysses S. Grant and the United States of America.  Artemis Gordon was the master of disguise, who used at least one per episode; and Jim West had these Swiss Army Boots that seemed to have whatever gadget he needed conveniently hidden in the heel. 

You know what?  I've thought of more spies than I expected to, and my deadline is fast approaching!  I think I'll stop here for now and continue in my next post!   

Until then, I wish you all...

Good Adventuring!
Timothy A. Sayell