Billion Dollar Brain (1967)

Director:

Ken Russell

Writers:

Len Deighton (novel)
John McGrath (screenplay)

Release Date:

20 December 1967 (USA)

Genre:

Adventure | Drama | Thriller

Tagline:

Pow . . . Power . . . Brainpower

Plot:

A former British spy stumbles into in a plot to overthrow Communism with the help of a supercomputer. But who is working for whom?

Plot Keywords:

British | Private Detective | Spy | Harry Palmer | Texas

Cast

  (Cast overview, first billed only)

Michael Caine	...	Harry Palmer
Karl Malden	...	Leo Newbigen
Ed Begley	...	General Midwinter
Oskar Homolka	...	Colonel Stok (as Oscar Homolka)
Françoise Dorléac	...	Anya (as Francoise Dorleac)
Guy Doleman	...	Colonel Ross
Vladek Sheybal	...	Dr. Eiwort
Milo Sperber	...	Basil
Janos Kurutz	...	Latvian gangster
Alexei Jawdokimov	...	Latvian gangster
Paul Tamarin	...	Latvian gangster
Iza Teller	...	Latvian gangster
Mark Elwes	...	Birkenshaw
Stanley Caine	...	G.P.O. special delivery boy
Gregg Palmer	...	1st Dutch business man

Runtime:

111 min

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Color:

Color (as De Luxe)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Australia:PG | Finland:K-16 | Sweden:15 | UK:PG | West Germany:16

Filming Locations:

297 Pentonville Road, King's Cross, London, England, UK

Company:

Jovera S.A.

Trivia:

Michael Caine performed most of his own stunts. During the final ice floe scene, he almost slipped and fell into freezing water.

Goofs:

Continuity: After being freed from detainment, Harry Palmer attends the end of a symphony concert, which is supposed to feature Dmitri Shostakovich's "Leningrad" Symphony, written in 1941 during the siege of Leningrad by German troops. What we hear, however, is the end of Shostakovich's 11th Symphony "The Year 1905". Yet, music from the "Leningrad" symphony is featured later on during Midwinter's speech to his soldiers in Finland and during the final battle on the ice.

Quotes:

Col.Ross: Your business is dead, Palmer. You're just about keeping alive on cornflakes.
Harry Palmer: The're full of vitamins.
Col.Ross: Really?
Harry Palmer: Yeah.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Harry Saltzman: Showman (2000) (V)

Soundtrack:

A Hard Day's Night

Imaginative and unfairly maligned sixties classic

I'm baffled by the dislike afforded this enjoyable sixties romp. The charge that it is less realistic than the previous films is groundless because the others weren't the real world either. The first featured some daft business with a psychedelic torture chamber and the second some far fetched romps around the Berlin wall. Of course, the events in 'Brain' are no less credible. The kremlin wouldn't allow a top Colonel to be chums with a British spy, let alone allow him to wander around Latvia taking photographs. The real purpose is to open the plot and make it more colourful, and also the opportunity to satirise entrenched positions and the madness of humanity. Recent events in Russia, especially under Yeltsin, prove that truth is definitely stranger than fiction. The score is terrific and the breath-neck direction may be enough to make it accessible to young, contemporary film fans.

The cast is superb. Guy Doleman is brilliant again as the supercilious Colonel Ross. The scene where he spills the cereals and refuses to move his feet while Palmer sweeps them up is priceless. The Russian spy Anya gives a hilarious speech of ennui about her father on the boat with Palmer and Oskar Homolka as Colonel Stock gives a short, classic lament on the ice flow written by John McGrath who does a great job here, especially in his cutting swipes at blinkered thinking. "The air in Texas is pure. That's why I haven't set foot outside of Texas in twenty five years" yells the batty General Midwinter. But the most chilling and truthful exchange occurs between Palmer and amoral spy Leo Newbigen. "When he gets between five miles of the Latvian border, every alarm in the world is gonna blow and four minutes later no one is going to be around." - "You want your money, don't you?"

Ken Russell began his career doing documentaries about classical composers and his experience pays off here in his use of sound with image. Anyone bored with current fair and hasn't seen this trilogy could do worse in giving them a go. This one was the best, in my opinion.