The criminal organization THRUSH steals the A-bomb H957 and demands $350,000,000 to be delivered within 72 hours by their former antagonist Solo. So U.N.C.L.E. has to reactivate the super agents Solo and Kuryakin after they were 15 years out of business. Equipped in the usual 007 fashion they start to seek the villains. When THRUSH steals a nuclear weapon and demands a ransom delivered by Napoleon Solo, UNCLE recalls him and his partner to duty. Aside from one of the theatrical cuts of a two-part episode of the original, this was my first real look at anything U.N.C.L.E. I was a spy fanatic and had great expectations, based somewhat on the comments that a favorite Marvel comic, "Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D." owed its existence to U.N.C.L.E. To say I was disappointed would be an understatement. It looked like every other TV show of the period and the leads weren't young anymore. The fantastic gadgets were rather mundane and the super-guns almost non-existent.<br/><br/>Some years later, I saw this again, with a more forgiving eye. There is a sense of fun to be had and it does follow the formula of the show, of which I had seen portions on video. McCallum and Vaughn are great and Anthony Zerbe makes for a great villain (as he usually played on TV show of the era). Although it doesn't look studio-bound like the TV series, you can't mistake the southern California and Nevada settings. Also, the camp (though a large part of later seasons) doesn't always work and is employed a bit too much in the end. Plus, Keenan Wynn seems wasted. On the whole, though, it's at least fun and entertaining. We do get some action throughout, as well as the intrigue and there is an attempt at character development.<br/><br/>The best summation is that the film is a bit of a disappointment for a real, top-quality U.N.C.L.E. movie, but a nice re-union for the TV series. The budget is comparable to a TV episode and it suffers from standard TV editing. The are strange decisions made, like the creation of a new U.N.C.L.E. Special gun, but it is barely seen in the film. The originals were as much stars of the show as the actors. U.N.C.L.E. and THRUSH are shown to be somewhat laughable, than real professionals. Still, it is nice seeing everyone back and they carry things off with charm and style. Patrick MacNee and George Lazenby make nice tongue-in-cheek references to other iconic spy properties. The Hoover Dam setting works well for the climax and adds a bit of scope.<br/><br/>Before this was made, there had been a script floating around for an U.N.C.L.E. feature film. One wonders what could have been done with a major budget and top levelly resources. Who knows? The premise still has enough originality to spawn a modern feature, though one hopes that enough of the fantasy elements would be maintained to keep it from being "Bourne from U.N.C.L.E." Reunion TV-movies based on old series rarely capture the spirit of the original, but Return of the Man from Uncle taps into the campiness of the series as if it never was off the air. The leads have fun acknowledging their age, and the whole thing neatly turns into a parody of spy films without becoming a parody of itself. I rated it a "9" not because it is great art but because compared to all other TV reunion movies it is head and shoulders above the rest!
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371 weeks ago