Dick Barton Strikes Back (1949) was the last filmed of the three Dick Barton movies made by Hammer Films, although it was the second to be released. This was the closest that the Barton series ever got to Ian Fleming's James Bond books (which Fleming had not yet even begun writing) in content and spirit. Indeed, if Dick Barton at Bay (1950) was the precursor to an Avengers episode, then Dick Barton Strikes Back was close in spirit to the early Fleming novels. Not only is the plot especially sinister, involving the systematic mass murder of civilians, but there's also a certain amount of racism (typical of Fleming), with the foreign agents using swarthy, lower-class Europeans (seemingly gypsies) to carry out their plans against England (albeit with the help of a turncoat nobleman). In addition, the villain played by Sebastian Cabot, without his beard, but with his familiar girth, is the physical prototype for a Bond villain -- outsized physically and very verbose, as well as disdainful toward the hero. There are lots of holes in the plot, and the moments of humor still don't quite work, but they don't interrupt or slow down the story, either. The staging of the fights is amateurish, but one of them (aboard an elevator) as devised is interesting in that it anticipates the savage hand-to-hand struggle between Sean Connery and Joe Robinson in Diamonds Are Forever. Finally, the denouement, an extended, multi-layered cliffhanger, also manages to borrow a shot and camera set-up from Jules Dassin's Naked City (1948).
by Bruce Eder
review
