The Silencers (film)

The Silencers is an American spy film spoof motion picture released in 1966 and starring Dean Martin as agent Matt Helm. It is loosely based upon the novel The Silencers by Donald Hamilton, as well as another of Hamilton's Helm novels, Death of a Citizen.

Co-starring with Martin are Stella Stevens, Daliah Lavi, James Gregory and Victor Buono.

Plot
Once a photographer by day, spy by night, Matt Helm is now a happily retired secret agent, shooting photos of glamorous models instead of guns and enjoying a close relationship with his assistant, the lovely Lovey Kravezit. But then his old boss, Macdonald, coaxes him back to the agency ICE to thwart a new threat from the villainous organization Big O.

The sinister Tung-Tze is masterminding a diabolical scheme to drop a missile on an underground atomic bomb test in New Mexico and possibly instigate a nuclear war in the process. Helm's assignment is to stop him, armed with a wide assortment of useful spy gadgets, plus the assistance of the capable femme fatale, Tina, and the seemingly incapable Gail Hendricks, a beautiful but bumbling possible enemy agent.

Along the way, Helm is nearly sidetracked by a mysterious knife-wielding seductress and he witnesses the murder of a beautiful Big O operative, the sultry striptease artist Sarita.

In the end, Helm prevails, with Gail by his side as he all but singlehandedly destroys Tung-Tze's evil enterprise and plot to rule the world.

Cast

 * Dean Martin as Matt Helm
 * Stella Stevens as Gail Hendricks
 * Daliah Lavi as Tina
 * Victor Buono as Tung-Tze
 * Arthur O'Connell as Wigman
 * Robert Webber as Sam Gunther
 * James Gregory as Macdonald
 * Nancy Kovack as Barbara
 * Roger C. Carmel as Andreyev
 * Cyd Charisse as Sarita
 * Beverly Adams as Lovey Kravezit
 * Richard Devon as Domino

Production
Film producer Irving Allen had been in partnership with Albert R. Broccoli in Warwick Productions, who released through Columbia Pictures. Broccoli wanted to buy the rights to the James Bond series of novels, but Allen was not interested. The partnership broke up, Broccoli went into partnership with Harry Saltzman and United Artists on the Bond films and enjoyed tremendous success.

Allen decided to make his own spy series. He optioned film rights to the Matt Helm novels in 1964 in association with Columbia Pictures. The Silencers was to be the first. Dean Martin signed to play the lead.

Director Phil Karlson had the idea to make the film in a tongue-in-cheek style. Comedy writer Herbert Baker revised Oscar Saul's original script. Dean Martin was a co-producer of the Helm series. Moss Mabry provided the costumes, except for Martin's Sy Devore suits.

Richard Levinson and William Link also worked on the script of this and The Ambushers, the third film in the Matt Helm series.

Themes
The film was the first of four produced between 1966 and 1969 starring Martin. The film series includes James Gregory as Macdonald, Helm's superior (played by John Larch in the fourth film) and Beverly Adams as Lovey Kravezit, Helm's photo assistant (character missing in fourth film). Whereas Hamilton's books were generally serious spy novels about a former Second World War assassin who is recruited to continue killing for an American government agency, the film versions were lighthearted spy romps spoofing the James Bond series in the same spirit as Our Man Flint, which was released the previous month. The Helm series has been cited as one of the principal inspirations for the Austin Powers spy comedies of the 1990s and early 2000s.

Reception
Released at the height of James Bond mania, The Silencers was a major box office hit in 1966, earning $7 million in United States rentals that year.

There were three follow-up films, including Murderers' Row (also released in 1966), The Ambushers (1967) and The Wrecking Crew (1969). A fifth film, The Ravagers, was announced, but never produced.

Soundtrack
Elmer Bernstein provided the score. The title song is performed by Vikki Carr, though Cyd Charisse opens the film with a sexy striptease-style dance while lip synching to Carr's vocals. Carr also sings "Santiago" on the soundtrack. Two soundtrack albums were released — Bernstein's original score on an RCA Victor album that does not feature any artwork of Dean Martin, and a Reprise album by Martin singing several songs that were featured in the film, along with some instrumentals by the Mike Leander Orchestra.

A scopitone video of the title song was sung by Joi Lansing. Carr's version of the title song was also used on the soundtrack of the film Confessions of a Dangerous Mind.

Recently, English label Vocalion have issued full movie soundtrack on a CD, catalog number CDLK4573.

Adaptation
The Silencers borrows a plot element from the first Helm novel, Death of a Citizen, as it begins with the agent being coaxed out of retirement. Helm's mission is to stop an evil organization called "BIG O" (the Bureau for International Government and Order) from their plan of "Operation Fallout": diverting an American missile into an underground atomic bomb testing site in New Mexico.