Jazzy, beatnik themed 1965 time capsule from British Pathé with secret agent Mark Burns attempting to solve a murder in which he finds himself implicated. Joined by fellow agent Wanda Ventham posing as his fiancée, the pair must outsmart the seductive yet sinister Trisha Noble and her brawny bed partner Shaun Curry, before they pull-off a daring crime and disappear into the sunset.
The frantic pace set to a frenetic bongo arrangement and colourful Mediterranean scenery, almost compensate for a relatively thin plot, in which enchantress Noble's bronzed and bikini-clad rig saunters from scotch on the rocks, to scuba-diving into underwater caves leaving a trail of destruction in her voluptuous wake.
It's a visually attractive postcard light on sense, but somehow entertaining in spite of its plot weaknesses. Noble is better than you might think, and the set design and location work is all first-rate at depicting the mid-sixties Maltese tourist culture, its buzzing basement nightclubs, and azure blue sun-drenched coastline. A highly stylised cultural artefact worth preserving.
Review of Love Is a Woman
