If you've ever wanted to see Leslie Nielsen play a bad guy so bad he can get a Hong Kong call girl to scrub his back in the bathtub at the click of a finger, this is your film. Nielsen plays Jack Gallagher, a money hungry villain peripherally involved with Nazi war criminal Franz Kessler (Joseph Furst), who has managed to relocate to Hong Kong with his stash of deadly nerve gases intact. Dr. Douglas Pruitt (an over-emoting Richard Basehart), the head of supranational organisation 'E Force' (Environmental Force Authority), is on the trail of the bioweapons in an attempt to keep them out of the hands of freedom fighters/terrorists such as the 'People's Liberation Army'. Though And Millions Will Die! was shot on location in the Far East, the film can't disguise it's small screen roots, whether through Leslie Martinson's bland direction or Laurie Lewis's connect the dots score, which unsuccessfully attempts to blend elements of John Barry, Henry Mancini, and Lalo Schifrin. A pilot for a TV series that never was, this is an occasionally entertaining thriller with some pretty mild thrills.
Review of ...and Millions Die!
